How did it feel for you when you went from Active Duty to Reserves/National Guard? What was the biggest difference you noticed?

I was accustomed to a certain op-tempo and level of skill when I was on active duty. When I transitioned to the national guard, it was quite different. The unit obviously didn't have the same amount of training time, so skills weren't as sharp. There was also more time spent on administrative tasks that seemed more automatic on active duty.

When I went from the National Guard to the reserves, I went into a unit that deployed a lot, had soldiers activated a lot, and sent people to a lot of training. We were also gearing up for a 12 month deployment to Iraq. While I wasn't there all the time, like on active duty, I felt it was very similar. We had a lot of training time and skills were much sharper. I think that had a lot to do with the impending deployment.

I hated going from active to reserve... it was worse than going back to college. Discipline was non existent top to bottom. Maybe I just had a bad unit though...

I would choose active duty over Reserves/NG. Training is better, and more consistent than that of the Reserves/NG. but that is my opinion and I have been in all three components.