Figure 1. Erin's motivation to do chemistry (in arbitary, unnamed units) vs. time in months.It's a little hard to make it out, so I'll walk you through it:
first peak: around the time I started working on a new project that I never actually finished (I will spare the non-chemists from even having to read the words that they don't understand). I emerged from some sort of mid-semester slump with the winning of a Fulbright and the K-dawg forcing me and Seiko to be friends again after some fight we'd had after both being really stressed out by making us talk about new chemistry ideas.
Then, I got a little sick of working 40 hours a week and maybe got a little burned out, but then I went to Germany, took a horrible German glass, and drank German beer and wine and ate delicious Brötchen, and started to long for the lab. That is the second peak.
Then, I got to the lab, realized I had to distill solvents for everything, could pick these solvents up for 30 min. each day, that it took hours to get a simple proton NMR back, that the stockroom was only open two hours a day, that I've never actually had a one-on-one meeting with the professor I'm working for, and that my research is kind of pointless, and I got discouraged.
Then, I got into grad school, went on visits, and thought I maybe should use my time in Germany to learn all that I possibly could. This is the third peak.
Then, I came back to Germany, realized that took more initiative than I could muster, and that even if I worked pretty hard, my research wasn't going to get anywhere in the time I had left, and my motivation plummeted.
Let's just hope it picks up when I get to grad school.
At least I get to travel and eat Brötchen. (I know bread rolls shouldn't be that exciting, but if you've never had a German roll, or better yet, a German breakfast with rolls, don't judge. SOO delicious.)
first peak: around the time I started working on a new project that I never actually finished (I will spare the non-chemists from even having to read the words that they don't understand). I emerged from some sort of mid-semester slump with the winning of a Fulbright and the K-dawg forcing me and Seiko to be friends again after some fight we'd had after both being really stressed out by making us talk about new chemistry ideas.
Then, I got a little sick of working 40 hours a week and maybe got a little burned out, but then I went to Germany, took a horrible German glass, and drank German beer and wine and ate delicious Brötchen, and started to long for the lab. That is the second peak.
Then, I got to the lab, realized I had to distill solvents for everything, could pick these solvents up for 30 min. each day, that it took hours to get a simple proton NMR back, that the stockroom was only open two hours a day, that I've never actually had a one-on-one meeting with the professor I'm working for, and that my research is kind of pointless, and I got discouraged.
Then, I got into grad school, went on visits, and thought I maybe should use my time in Germany to learn all that I possibly could. This is the third peak.
Then, I came back to Germany, realized that took more initiative than I could muster, and that even if I worked pretty hard, my research wasn't going to get anywhere in the time I had left, and my motivation plummeted.
Let's just hope it picks up when I get to grad school.
At least I get to travel and eat Brötchen. (I know bread rolls shouldn't be that exciting, but if you've never had a German roll, or better yet, a German breakfast with rolls, don't judge. SOO delicious.)
4 comments:
I assure you that you're not the only one losing motivation. (I thought it was supposed to happen later on in life... like mid-life-ish.:P) Hey, at least you got to spend a year in Germany. It doesn't get much better than that on the awesomeness scale. :)
believe me when I say that the grad school curve looks about the same, except you just keep working long hours anyways and you have a very sharp productivity peak at the end as you graduate.
See....
http://www.phdcomics.com/comics/archive.php?comicid=125
don't worry, you will pull through...I've been told that life is happy after graduate school. :-)
This is brilliant - love that you actually took the time to draw it out on a sheet of paper, too. Scary thing is, we're almost done here already...my chemical motivation could also be described as a steady downward trend these days.
1. this entry made me crack up.
2. when we had a fight those were the good old times. i miss smith a lot. remember our third floor hallway?
3. let me know if you need help with apt finding.
4. who is charity? i think this person has heard a lie that life is happy in grad school, at least in orgo.
5. do non-chem while u can, don't worry about your downhill motivation slope. it'll be waay more exciting to enter grad school starting low than high :)
6. when are you coming here?? i can't believe you're really coming!!
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