I'm sick of The Race. I'm both irritated and bored by the rush to finish projects and write papers and not get scooped (which almost never happens in my field anyway) and all the rest of it. I want to just relax and enjoy what I'm doing. If I do it right, then presentations and papers should come naturally as part of the process.
I want to do science because it’s interesting and fun and valuable. There are lots of other jobs I could be doing that would get me more money with less education. If science isn't fun or interesting, then there's little point in doing it for me. Sure, there's the benefit scientists provides society. But I feel like I could do as much or more good in another profession. It would just be a very different sort of good.
The other day, my carpool buddy was fretting about some deadline that he didn't think he could meet. Ecogeoman and I are constantly doing the same, both for external deadlines and the ones we set ourselves for motivation. But I suddenly realized how arbitrary our deadlines are. No one is going to die on an operating table or starve in the immediate future if we don't meet our deadlines.* My research is very important, but not it’s just not that urgent.
That thought brought on a welcome sense of relaxation. I have been thinking about how all this worrying about meeting goals takes mental energy away from actually doing the work. I want to focus on the parts of my job that are fun and interesting. I'm tired of spinning my wheels, planning and replanning my future, both immediate and distant. I need a break from all the fuss to just do my work and enjoy it for what it is rather than doing to meet an arbitrary deadline or because it's good for my career. I want to do it because it's good for science. My career will follow.
I hope that this change of attitude will provide some renewal of my motivation. But rather than renewing my fortitude to meet an arbitrary goal, I hope to renew my excitement about my research, and that’s all.
*I know some of you work in fields where this might be the case.
scientiae-carnival
8 comments:
...of course, if *I* don't meet my deadlines, I risk the wrath of The Boss....which could be worse than being on an operating table... ;)
Yeah, I think I'd be fired if I didn't meet my deadlines! Although any trouble I've had this week has come from other people, not from me. Honest!
I think your new attitude is great. I hope I can adopt it. My field is the same, that you don't really get scooped and many deadlines aren't really that important. I was feeling horrible when I couldn't meet the paper deadline in December (I literally broke down in a crying fit at home and the husband had to convince me to stop fighting it and tell the editor that I couldn't meet the deadline. I've rarely felt so relieved as after this. It didn't matter at all. The editor was understanding. The paper didn't get into the special volume, but it is submitted now to a much better journal and I saved my sanity.
To be clear, I don't mean that I intend to blow off deadlines. Rather, I want to stop only working for the goals that I (or others) set. I'm always going on about how if I finish this by Tuesday, then do that on Wednesday, I'll be able to do that analysis next week and then... I want to stop thinking so much about how to get my work done and just do my work instead. No more if I write this up and then get that lab work done and then write that, I'll be able to have two papers out and one in press by the time I graduate and.... It's exhausting.
That's true. I was just telling someone the other day about how I can be more exhausted by self-imposed deadlines than those that are externally imposed.
Excellent attitude.
Great post! I am happiest and most productive when I am working because I enjoy what I'm doing. Although for me, having hard deadlines every once in a while can be good for helping me focus and prioritize. A balance between the two, if I ever figure out how to achieve that, would be perfect!
I try to keep this attitude as much as possible - when I get that overwhelmed feeling I repeat my mantra "Nothing in academia is an emergency." over and over again. Because you're right, no one is going to die if you don't meet a deadline. (Not that its a good habit to have, but it puts things into perspective.)
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