What's the easiest or smoothest way to switch from the TX National Guard to Active Duty?

Thats what I thought in 1982 when I switched from NG to Active Duty. Your going to learn though that doing the same thing over and over again gets to be repetitious and eventually boring. You don't experience as a NG beacause you only meet one weekend a month. Yes, you can move up in rank, move onto another MOS at re-enlistment time, but even those paths only challenge you so much. At your age though I would still say go for it regardless because your going to meet some great people and have some great times and you can afford the small detour an Active Duty tour is going to be on your 45 year work lifespan. My advice would be to have an exit plan though. Don't jump in the pool without an exit out if you find you do not like it. Be it the college fund, a plan for vocational training once your in, or whatever else. Always have a plan B in life and a plan C for everything you do. You will run into people on Active Duty that hate being there and feel they are trapped with no way out...........that never had a plan B, they just jumped in and hoped for the best, only finding out later they did not like it that much. Oh yeah agree with what others say, you need to push the 368 yourself, your NG Retention NCO's job is to discourage you from leaving the unit in anyway he or she can.

EDIT, sorry I meant to say I switched in 1984 not 1982, my memory is already starting to fail me....yikes.

Go to a local recruiter, have them fill out and give you a 368, give it to your unit. If they allow you to leave the NG, the 368 will have to be approved by your entire chain of command. Expect anywhere from a 1-3 month wait.

The time you are waiting you better be PTing EVERY DAY, just like they do on active duty. Even if you do, you will probably still be behind on the physical side of the house. Better start working hard.