I was attending a two-day python-oriented workshop in New York City (PyGotham 2019). I came across this talk on “How to accept your successes.”
At times, I wonder how much of my skills are valued by non-scientists outside of academia. Have I been receiving all these years of training in graduate school to acquire the skillsets needed to strive as an academician and only as an academician? But what if I would like to try something outside academia? Are my skills being valued?
Getting honest opionions and improving myself
I have a very weird habit. I love asking friends and friends I’ve only made in a few weeks/months what do they think are my strengths and weaknesses. I thank all my friends for pointing out my short-comings, allowing me to become more self-aware of how I can improve. On the other hand, I struggle to give credits to myself whenever they tell me about my strengths. It’s quite an unattractive trait to deny honest opinions from others. I fully acknowledge it as one of my flaws.
I view some of the strengths my friends find in me as the basic requirements for being a succesful PhD student. It’s crucial to be critical, on top of things, responsible, driven, curious, persistent, ingenious, and so on.
Perhaps I should approach this differently
At the talk, the speaker mentioned how one can feel lost and uncertain about the defintion of “success” when we slow down and realize that we have met all the markers of our childhood dreams.
It led to some introspection.
I have always wanted to study the universe and even work at NASA while growing up. This is partly why I am here in the US. Over the years, I have put in countless hours to become good at what I do and push my boundaries as far as I could to get the most of graduate school. After publishing papers after papers, writing proposals after proposals, filling up my Curriculum Vita (CV) with awards, talks, and so, I start to feel lost. I start to wonder what have I achieved up to this point in my life?
Whatever success may mean in whoever’s eyes, I am not chasing after being successful, I am just doing what I want to.
In the eyes of many, I may be a very successful PhD student, I have given >20 talks internationally, published 5 first author papers, written many highly ranked telescope proposals for highly competitive facilities, etc. (Oh! And attending an Ivy League school is another one I get a lot from friends outside of my academic circle.) But honestly, I am just doing what I think I should be doing/want to be doing. I have not thought about what success would mean to me in this picture. Would publishing more papers make me more successful? I doubt, at least not in my opinion.
I think my highest achievements at this point is having a lot of friends to learn from, a lot of people to inspire me and help me in becoming a better person everyday, teach me life lessons, and giving me a chance to live like a human being.
My greatest success is that I am loved.