Self talk.

PAST.

I'm no good. I'm embarrassed to even be walking the Earth. I want to get run over by a bus. I want to crawl under a rock and stay there. I don't want to talk to anyone. Or make eye contact. Or talk to them. Or declare my presence.  I am an impostor. Anxiety boils over in my head. I am extremely perfectionist. I am neurotic. 

Why bother investing in myself? Nothing will work out for me no matter what I do. I question and ruminate on every decision I make no matter how insignificant. 

I don't love myself. Rationally, I know there are people who care about me, but I don't  know why. I know I'm better off than many, but still feel awful about it. Truly, the world would be better off without me. I don't matter. Or count. I'm useless. 

Things can't possibly change. I'm too...old, set in my ways, don't know what I'm doing, uncertain, indecisive, asocial...I am wrong. A mistake.

PRESENT.

I am doing more. I am in the arena a little more often. I have accepted my my introverted nature and understand more that it's not a flaw, just a part of who I am. I am inching my way back up to feeling like it's OK for me to live life. Doing something. Or at least trying to. I still don't have a good direction to go in. I am trying to prevent career burnout by doing things for myself that are novel and new. And enjoyable. I am exploring slightly more. And through this blog, commenting on things through Twitter (my tweets made it onto the #Sciquester home page the AAAS had!), emailing people and asking for the things I need more often. I try to do something that will make me uncomfortable every day...I even succeed sometimes.

I am much more open to feedback. A friend of mine- @MalaChakraborti- who has been a huge support to me when I was in my deepest depression wrote this to me recently: 

"You have a pretty strong tendency to qualify your sentiments, and sometimes you go pretty far at the self deprecation part. The reason I'm pointing it out is because I think it no longer really represents your true opinion of yourself in that situation, but has become a habit from a time when the sentiment was stronger."

I have noticed this myself. When I write, or speak to people, I still come from a perspective that I don't have a clue and am not confident. While it's true that I don't feel I have a ton of confidence, I do try to have a more confident voice. I go back and edit things I write when I see equivocations in my writing whenever I see them. I'm sure I do a lot of that here in this blog (I'm doing it right now...), but this is meant to be fairly quick and informal writing. 

I am taking enjoyment in things a bit more. However, I am not engaged in my work. The idea of doing something else is still strong in my head (this economy scares me still- no more middle class apparently...). I am slowly being swallowed and stifled by my scientific career and feel I need something else to lead a meaningful life (having a significant other is a long standing goal of mine still). I just feel largely lifeless when I'm working. I like science, but the career prospects to stay in it are absolutely dismal. It keeps me up at night sometimes.

I am having more compassion for myself as well. Not that I feel like everything I'm doing is OK, but being kind to myself helps me recover from set backs.

Things I have done so far that make me uncomfortable are actually looking more into my finances, setting up a newish home network, learning and trying new things in the lab, talking more (even though my voice sounds weird when I am more extroverted...and feels like someone else talking entirely), I am using more tools to help organize myself- like doing a weekly review, using Evernote (awesome!), and Unclutter to keep my desktop clear.

I am continuing to learn about myself- reading about High sensitivity (pretty sure that fits me well) and learning more about will power/habit formation and trying to learn good ones. And continue to be more mindful. 

FUTURE.

I want to be bolder. Take more chances. Make more mistakes- and hopefully learn more from trying rather than reading theoretically about how something works. Not over thinking, which is still very much a habit of mine. I would love to just decide something and do it. Right then. And not be so afraid to spend money on things I want because I fear buying stupid things. And of course, I hope a major life change comes soon and I can truly announce the release of Ian 3.0.

Drive.

Motivation and drive to get things done has been on my mind lately. As well as the things that still get in my way. Several things I have run across have spoken to this lately:

• Biochem Belle (@BiochemBelle) had this  fantastic post about creating ideas, silencing your inner critic for a time, giving yourself space to generate ideas before nixing things in the bud outright (a tendency I certainly have).
• I also recently subscribed to Annie Murphy Paul's 'Brilliant Blog' and her post about a sense of community being important for learning.
• Kerry Ann Roquemore's series on academic perfectionism. I mentioned this series before even though I'd only read the first of the posts. I read the rest and it speaks to my struggles with perfectionism and how I've at least started to take some positive steps towards addressing it.
• I also just watched 'I'm Fine, Thanks', a documentary I was introduced to via itstartswith.com, @sarahkpeck's blog about getting things done and living life well. I had tears in my eyes in recognition during the whole thing. 

All four of these things really resonated with me strongly. Here's why:

• Perfectionism also takes on the guise of my inner critic that shoots down dieas before they even fully form and have time to breathe. Or before I even try.
• Perfectionism is isolating. One thing I've been taught again and again is that learning happens best with other people. For feedback, for support, for new ideas and for getting used to a new environment. Perfectionism keeps you on the sidelines. "It's not the critic who counts...." comes to mind. Perfectionism keeps you out of the arena.
• One things I've lacked as a postdoc is drive. Perfectionism is truly devastating. It's one reason for my disconnection. It's also the reason I procrastinate on things; if they're not going to be perfect, why start? It really is a self-defeating way of thinking. My tendency is to avoid people as an introvert, but they are essential to an effective learning environment.
• When I watched 'I'm Fine, Thanks', it has made me see that I have been defined by a vision that has been defined by others. Namely, grad school, postdoc, then faculty position, then tenure, etc. Oh and a significant other, possibly a family along the way. The straight line to success that doesn't really exist. I feel stuck & disconnected in my current position. I don't have a good history with relationships. And I don't quite have a good idea of what my vision is. I'm starting to question and push that direction, but my feeling right now is that I'm not sure bench research is what I want to be doing forever. The director of the movie decided to make his dream of making a film come true; I like asking and finding answers to questions, but my current setting is not conducive to that.

With this blog, I'm trying to address perfectionism by just writing it pretty loosely and not worrying too much about 'tight' writing. And then putting it out into the world and realizing that it's not fatal. I do strive to be good enough. And coherent. And sometimes clever. 

Perfectionism is deadly. Don't participate. Get past it. Address the underlying insecurity that drives it. Academics do seem very prone to perfectionism. It will lead into depression and other bad places. If you're a perfectionist, join me on the road to recovery. 

Ask.

This is my list of words that I'll be returning to again and again in 2013:

Ask.

I've heard this idea from a number of places. Have a word you can return to to check in with and make sure you're actually going after your goals for the year. 

Ask is my word because asking is how I can reconnect with the world. What questions do I need to ask?

• How do I_____?
• Would you like to ____ with me ('go out', e.g.)?
• Can you teach me________?
• I am applying for _________.
• Where can I find _________?
• Can I help you___________?
• Have you read__________?
• Did I do this the best way I could have?
• Do you think you can give me some feedback?
• Will you publish my paper?
• I'm curious about________. 
• Do I have to be a postdoc forever?
• Have I formed better habits around_____?
• I would like __________.

I don't ask things of people or myself nearly enough. I settle for the status quo. I of course will ask questions in the lab and hopefully ask good ones. For too long, I've just not asked due in large part to a fear of vulnerability. I learned to hide behind 10 layers of brick wall in my mind and rarely let anyone in...not even me at times. What do I want? I've almost never had a good answer for this question. 

You may have noticed I have some other words below 'Ask'. These are other words to focus on this year. Finish, doing, deciding, writing and it will be good enough. Not perfect. I made this image the lock screen on my phone and I put it into Evernote as a note so hopefully I'll look at this often and be reminded. Asking terrifies me a lot of the time. I'm that person who won't even bring up bad service at a restaurant to the server; or often ask why something is one way vs. another. 

So my main word for this year is to ask. Of others. Of myself. Of the internet. 

Do you have a word or words for 2013?

Learning deeply.

I recently finished reading "What the Best College Students Do" and it fits in with what I've been writing about in my blog. I've had a few weeks since I finished it to think about it, so I thought I'd share my thoughts about how it might apply it to my own life as well as how this might impact my teaching practices and how I think about them. I am writing this from memory, so any content I talk about is what I am recalling (best way to review a book, almost certainly not).

The book is definitely not about how to get good grades. Ken Bain focuses a lot more on what he calls 'deep learning'. It is basically learning from a vulnerable and authentic place, a theme I've run across again and again in my readings this last year. 

This is contrasted with those he calls 'surface learners', who just learn what they need to get the grade or pass the exam. In other words, getting good grades to please someone else, not themselves. Sounds very familiar.

The profiles of 'deep learners' in the book include a lot of very prominent people, including Stephen Colbert and Neil deGrasse Tyson (two of my favorite people), but also other people who are not as well know but who he considers to be deep learners. What they all have in common is a curiousity about the world and a particular perspective and passion they found to follow through with. I found myself wishing I had that kind of clarity when I was younger. Sadly, I, like many others, were fixated on doing well in school as an end. Of course, that's not really the point of getting an education. 

The book starts off with a course taught at a college in Texas called 'integration of abilities' that sounds like it would have been torture for me to go through. The whole idea was to get in touch with the rhythms of your own mind, perceive the world in multiple ways, break things down and build them up again. Basically getting in touch with what matters to you, linking your interests in disparate things together. From there, you go off and learn what you need to do to succeed. 

In the book, he highlights research about having a 'growth mindset' as opposed to a 'fixed mindset' (the former is far superior I'm learning in my own life now). Bain also goes through studies of how the brain best learns, what is a good use of our time (reading, writing, e.g.) and having self-compassion (basically accepting things that happen, not ripping yourself apart, and moving on). 

In sum, I would say the best college students take a Bayesian approach. They incorporate new data, new knowledge into their current model of the world. All these people also seem to take chances and be very self-assured. They also try, fail, try again and learn from their errors. They embrace failure as a way to learn. Almost the opposite of perfectionists.

As for how this will affect how I teach, or create the learning environment for students, I think it is a challenge to create a deep learning environment. But there are some things I will incorporate such as giving students chances for ungraded trial and error before a graded task is assigned. Also, having students keep a journal of their class appears beneficial as well. However, I think there are limits to what individual teachers can do; there do need to be cultural and institutional shifts that focus less on tests and more on truly measuring learning (the two aren't necessarily the same thing). 

In my personal life, this is the message I've been trying to incorporate into my mind for the last year. Be vulnerable. Embrace failure. Try and try again. Do new things as much as possible. Ask whether you learned something new each day. Take chances. Bomb and realize that it's not that bad; it is survivable. I still feel like I'm trying to find what I truly care deeply about, or at least need to get out from under the large amount of shame I carry around with me most days which really does drive my disconnection from the world (I'm reading up on this more- reading Brene Brown's book 'Daring Greatly'). I really want to come in from the cold and am slowly wending my way back into connecting and possibly learning deeply.