Yep - I have been totally MIA for the past several months.
I taught my first course - which was total chaos - but really enjoyed it. I haven't gotten my evaluations back yet, so here's hoping. I may not enjoy it so much in a couple months when they roll in.
Other than that not too much to report - I've gotten a couple grants, which has been...
Awesome...Unexpected...Overwhelming...Thrilling...Exciting...Scary...
Yes, all of the above. Even scary. No one mentions that once you get a grant, you actually have to do the work. This implies hiring more grad students/post docs. Which implies growing your research group. Everyone focuses so much on the difficulty of getting grants, no one warns you what happens post-grant getting.
As such, my group is growing way faster than I had planned. I'm almost in double digits. Counting undergrads, I'm well in the double digits. I have to appear calm and confident to everyone, all of the time. Simultaneously, my mood is alternating between " oh shit, oh shit, oh shit" and "I'm so awesome". The swings are much, much worse than anything I have ever experienced. A some point it will all blur together into some nice balance of "I'm the shit", but that hasn't happened yet.
Anyway, everyone, good luck.
9 years ago
3 comments:
Welcome back! I had you listed on "blog's I'm following" and was excited to see your return to action.
I'm very glad to see you back as well. I think your comment about the highs and lows resonates with how I felt in graduate school. (It would be interesting if the highs and lows are even more pronounced when I get a faculty position!) In grad school I told myself that being between "wow-I'm on top of it!" and "yikes- I'm not smart enough to be here!" meant that I was in just the right place. Sorta like the story about the three bears. Interestingly, I hear these types of comments more from women than men...
Yep - definitely more pronounced in women. It has even been given a title (hasn't everything though): "the impostor syndrome". I used to not believe in it... until I did.
Now I counsel female undergrads through and around it.
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