Welcome to graduate school. You’ve been accepted to a prestigious research university and world-reknown scholastic institution. You’ve impressed your now-research advisor, who decided to choose you out of all available applicants, and you’ve already received a research assistantship and a fellowship to boot. Everything feels great.
You’ve worked in this domain for a few years after completing your undergraduate work in another, loosely related field, but you don’t quite have the upper-level, formal understanding as someone with a degree. Your job experience was pretty hands-on, and even though you knocked that out of the park, it only dealt with a small percentage of the encompassing knowledge that most of your peers already have going into grad school. So, you start to worry a bit, but that’s normal – it’s a new thing, and you’re good at picking up new things quickly, so you have some confidence.
The expanse of knowledge first becomes a little daunting as you look over the schedule of courses. Most of the upper-level, foundational classes are already full, so you opt for the 8 AM junior-senior course that’s mostly empty, and you figure you’ll bite the bullet on two graduate courses that you’d rather take the undergraduate introductions first. But that’s okay, you’re good at assimilating a lot of knowledge coherently in a short time. It’ll be a challenge, but you’re up for a good challenge.
Candidacy exams, right. You should have studied for that over the summer, but you decided to stick out your job up until, oh, 7 PM on Friday of the weekend before you show up at your advisor’s office first thing on Monday. You needed the money – graduate school shills you near-poverty income knowing fair well that you have no other option. But the money was secondary. You mostly offered to stay at your job because they were good for you, and you were good for them.
However, now you’re starting to feel the dread creep up on you. Those extra hours you put in at work the weeks prior, they’ve caught up, and now you’re drained. You visit your mother that weekend in your hometown. It’s a busy time, and you get back home less than twelve hours before you have to show up on campus. You tell yourself, “I’ll take it easy at first, then quickly ramp up my efforts.” You only have a few shots at the candidacy exams, beginning a few brief weeks after classes begin. Since you’re a novice in most topics of your chosen doctoral field, you figure you’ll just spend a lot more time studying. Extra work – you’re used to that.
The first three days go well. You’re given a task, something you know you can do, and it takes you a few days, but you’ve got it. You show your results to a post-doc in the group, who seems pleased, but immediately finds a flaw in your work. That’s okay, you can afford to be humbled after being the know-it-all at your job for a few years. You’re starting over. You’re starting fresh.
And it’s finally terrifying, and you know you’re only pushing back until you’re inevitably revealed as an impostor. A fake who could make it in your special, specific workplace, but as soon as you re-enter academia, you’ve found yourself incompetent, incapable, and irreducibly stupid. You’ve pulled a few rabbits out of a hat to get into grad school, to get funding, but now the trick’s unveiled. You’re not a big shot. You’re not even a small fish in a big pond. You’re drowning in doubt and pressure that has no source other than yourself.
Welcome to graduate school. You’ve been accepted to a prestigious research university and world-reknown scholastic institution. You’ve impressed your research advisor, and you have a research assistantship and a fellowship. Everything feels fragile.
You don’t know what to prioritize. You don’t know how to start your research. You don’t understand the meaning of half of the technical words out of your advisor’s mouth. You smile and nod. You fake confidence. You feel a bit rattled. You feel like you’ll let everyone down. But you push forward, onto the first week of classes. You’re not going down without a fight, even against Goliath or Ronda Rousey.
Just drink your coffee. Read your group’s papers. Take your breaks. Jog, lift weights, or spar. Read the background chapters in your assigned textbooks. Leave Wikipedia open on your laptop. Drink a beer. Keep the wheels turning. Keep the ship upright.
It’s just graduate school.
