09 January 2013

Surviving Graduate School

Several interesting internet stumbles have appeared since my last post, and in my mind, they are related.

We have the hilarious #overlyhonestmethods Twitter hashtag.

And more seriously, some discussion about mental health in graduate school.
About a panic attack by See Arr Oh
An interchange between someone in and someone out by Chemjobber and Vinylogous.
I prefer the first piece, which was actually written in response the second. It feels totally honest and hit home with me in some ways. The second piece (which is actually a series and as of writing this, is unfinished) asks a lot of good questions but for me, doesn't feel as poignant or compelling.

I guess what prompted me to write this post is that I had similar experiences to See Arr Oh in my time here at graduate school (which continues). There was a period where I felt anxious on a daily basis, developed a social anxiety where I similarly felt trapped in seminars, and felt like the only thing that really helped fight the anxiety was alcohol. It didn't culminate in a panic attack, luckily, but did lead to crying bouts (usually not at work) and unmotivation in lab.

I think what helped me get through that time was a supportive baymate (ie the person you sit right next to in lab, where the benches back each other, like a bay), and past history with worse anxiety that gave me some coping mechanisms. Besides listening to my moaning, my baymate advised me that maybe actually achieving something in lab would help with my motivation. That by staying busy and celebrating small successes, I would regain some motivation. This worked to some extent, but was probably hindered by her enabling behaviors of wanting to drink with me. Obviously drinking is a poor choice in coping mechanism, and was one that developed in graduate school, but during my undergraduate, I had developed others that probably helped keep my head above water.

Bare with me now, but mostly it has to do with how you think of the cycles of anxiety and your mind. Developed from brushes with Eastern-influenced New Age thinking via my mother, I came to see that the thinking that builds anxiety is extremely cyclical and superfluous. In my case, my anxiety revolved around the future and the thoughts were often formed by "what if" questions, the answers to which are unknown - well, because it hasn't happened yet. You can see why this is a self-defeating and pointless circle, but the insidious nature of anxiety is that you get trapped inside and spiral downward. The second important point is that although your mind is very powerful and good at creating these self-defeating cycles, it is also under your control (to some extent). You can let it control you, or you can choose to control it, if its being rowdy. Different teachers have different opinions about what to do with dangerous thoughts, but the point is, you don't have to believe them. Either by pushing the thoughts away or confronting them to see what is really scaring you, you can stop the cycle or at least hinder it before you get too deep.

So, things are mostly better now. I can go to seminars, I'm not a complete alcoholic and I don't have crushing anxiety at every moment. But the anxiety is still there under the surface. One stray thought and it is back, but only as a shadow. There are periods of months where I don't have it at all. I basically have resigned myself to it as long as I'm in graduate school, especially with the uncertainness of my future as it is. Hopefully in the coming months, I will cement down a option for post-graduation.

One thing that I'm a little confused on, though... I continue to have a life outside of the lab which is fulfilling, with various hobbies and friends. However, in my own experience, and by looking at others, thinking about your project outside of lab can lead to much better productivity. In times when I was feeling the best about my project, and things were going well, I would think about my project all the time. So there has to be some tradeoff between hobbies and thinking of research outside of lab. In some sense, I understand profs when they don't want people to have hobbies, because for me, the hobbies are sort of a sign that I'm just not that into my project right now, and that I need other successes to build up my lab-eroded confidence. Of course, having profs require a lack of hobbies is unlikely to work and what probably leads to greater mental decline among students. Who is to say, I don't have the answers though...

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