Different people work different ways. I could never try to grind out two pages of a dissertation in a given day. I had all of the elements of an entire chapter kicking around in my head for many weeks. This would form during slow times during the day, a lot of my runs through the woods, and staring at the actual content of what I was working on. At some point, I would have 80% of a chapter done in my head. Then I would sit down and write it in a very short period of time, a day or two. At different times an outsider would think that I was either doing no work or doing a huge volume of work. Neither was quite the truth.
Statsman, from reading your original post and other things that you’ve mentioned throughout the thread, I can relate. A lot of the things that you mentioned reminded me of things/feelings that I’ve gone through and dealt with. I’ve had acute anxiety problems for my whole life, and I didn’t seek help until a few years ago when I was in my early 30s. Therapy and medication have made a world of difference for me.
Some other people have mentioned that exercise helps them to de-stress because it takes their mind away for a while and gives an endorphin rush. A friend of mine with a high-stress job used to like flying a small plane because it required focus, which left no room for thoughts about his job. If your exercise is causing you constant discomfort and occasional pain, then even though it may technically be taking your mind from your work, it’s not helping you to de-stress. You’d probably be better off doing something that is more fun, less painful, and that you are able to immerse yourself in. I’d suggest juggling or playing a musical instrument.
Another thing that reminded me of myself is your looking at your supergradstudent friend and thinking of how he has everything together. I used to compare myself to other people all the time, and it was never productive. When I’d look at my friends, I’d see people who were better mathematicians, who made more money, who had more success with relationships, and a host of other things. Then I’d start trying to rank my group of friends/grad students on different qualities, so I’d see that I wasn’t on the bottom. Then when I’d see someone that I thought I was “better” than do something impressive, I’d feel threatened. This was all completely counterproductive. Once I finally stopped doing all of this, I felt a lot better about myself.
I may be projecting, but I think that I see a lot of parallels between my situation and yours. The thing that has helped me out tremendously has been a combination of cognitive behavioral therapy and anti-anxiety medication. Since you have a therapist and psychiatrist, I’m guessing that you’re already taking meds. If they aren’t specifically for treating anxiety, maybe you’d want to talk to them about moving in that direction.
statsman1982, may I suggest a reason that this guy you describe as the uber-Ph.D. student seemed so unstressed? You mention that he was married. Perhaps his wife took care of all the stressful things at home. She cooked the meals, washed his clothes, did all the shopping, did all the cleaning of the house, paid the bills, etc. Also, I wonder if either his parents or his wife’s parents gave them money to help them while he was in grad school.
If so, that would be a lot more unstressful than the situation for most grad students. Most grad students had to take care of all the things at home themselves, since they were mostly single. The married ones were often married to other grad students, so they didn’t have it any easier. And some of us, like me, were barely able to live on what we got from working as a T.A. or whatever.
Until I left grad school at 29 and got a regular job, I had literally spent my entire life barely hanging on. My family was not desperately poor perhaps, but they were only a step or two above that, so I got used to just barely scraping by when I was a kid. During the 11 years I spent in college and grad school, I had nothing. Really, nothing. I barely could pay my expenses during that time, despite having a generous scholarship during my undergraduate years and teaching assistantships during much of grad school. I didn’t own a car, a TV set, a stereo, a telephone, or any of the other sorts of things that most people own. I didn’t take vacations.
I suspect that a lot of the differences between the stressed and the unstessed grad students has to do with the amount of money that they can live on while in grad school.
I … don’t understand this. How do you just write a dissertation? Didn’t you have to gather and analyze data? As far as I can tell, the write up is the easy part - it’s data gathering and cleaning and analysis and whatnot that takes forever.
Statsman, I feel ya. I’m starting year 8 of grad school. I’m sick of it. I don’t even have an office on campus this year. The job market is freaking me out. I do not have my shit together.
It depends on the area. If it’s pure mathematics or mathematical statistics, there’s little or no data; the work is in deriving some new formula or proving a new result.
The job hunt for me might not be as bad as it has been for the people I’ve known, for the simple fact that my standards aren’t very high. Those I used to talk with would lament that the job openings at “good” schools were either closed due to the economy or so competitive as to be nearly impossible to get in to.
“Good” schools are public ivies and real Ivies,by the way. Ohio State, Michigan, Florida, Nebraska, Kansas, Stanford, Harvard, Yale, etc. Any school that resembled the dreaded “teaching school” was treated with the highest disdain. One student I know likened it to flipping burgers. Seriously.
Sometimes I really wonder why I want to be a member of this club.
Honestly, being open to jobs at “teaching schools” is the key to happiness in academia. To get a job at a large research university, you not only have to stress out while in grad school, but you then have to spend several years hopping from adjunct position to visiting professor to blah blah blah, until someone decides to convert your temporary position into a tenure-track one.
Teaching colleges will hire you, treat you well, separate you from the viperlike academics, and provide you with students who have something really invested in their education (whereas the state schools, at least, have lots and lots of pwecious angels who just want to party). Since you said in your OP that you like to learn and to teach, I’d say go for it. I really wish I had.
This. Also, what multiple people have said about his having church (both as a support community and as a significant presence) in his life. Almost all the unstressed-looking grad students I know are married and heavily involved in their church.
My church performs a number of functions that would have been quite useful to me in grad school had I had been more involved/believing: a) you have a whole community of people who are not invested in the grad student lifestyle, allowing you to step back from it some; b) you are constantly told that worldly honors, prestige, etc. don’t count so much in the overall scheme of things next to religion and family, so you don’t stress out nearly as much about issues at work/school c) you are constantly told not to compare yourself to others, especially in worldly things like intelligence (doesn’t count for so much in the overall scheme yadda yadda), thus cutting down a LOT on stress from comparing yourself to others d) you are encouraged to live within a budget (the current ward I go to has a lot of students who are raising a family (one family has five children! living in a two-bedroom apartment!), so there are a lot of tips/stuff swappeda bout, and e) a whole community for support… if someone needs someone to talk to, stress to, or something more material like a meal brought in or whatever, that support network is there.
Yeah. This is something I struggled with too – I too am very strong in the language arts and read a lot of books – and if you are anything like me, your problem is at least partially that reading a math article is NOT anything like reading a book. I am great at reading books! I can read very quickly, skim, and retain a fairly good idea of what a story/book/whatever is about when it is not a math article.
Math articles need to be treated differently. This is something that took me a long time to learn. You CANNOT skim them the way you can a fiction story. The only way you can get through one quickly (say, if you are only interested in the gist of the article, and not the mechanics) is by reading the abstract and first paragraphs/introduction ONLY, and even then I’d have to underline important sentences, read those sentences twice, and write down one or two key equations from the paper.
If you are reading an entire article, you need to have a pad of paper by you, and each important equation you need to be writing it down and make sure you understand what every index or variable in the equation means. Make up examples if the paper doesn’t have them. Even if the paper does have them, make up a very simple stupid example and see if the formula/equation works for your stupid example. (e.g., let’s say you see the equation X^2 = sum_i (E-O)^2/E^2. Okay, I make up an example where I have an urn that I think has half red and half blue balls, but I really draw out 6 red ones and 4 blue ones. Okay, now I compute the X^2 term. Do I get something that matches what they say I should get and my intuition?) Make notes about things you think are important. Put question marks by equations you don’t understand and go back to them later or ask someone else about them. Underline key sentences. Try to follow derivations in the paper by writing them down yourself to see if you follow every step – often you will find they are skipping over steps to save time. Write those missing steps in the margin of the paper if it takes you more than a couple of seconds to figure it out.
It will take a really long time, and it may be very frustrating at first. But for papers that you really need to understand, this will save time in the long run by making you understand it better AND providing you with a set of notes so that if you go back to it you can say “Oh, yeah, that’s right, he didn’t mention it in the paper but he used Zorn’s lemma for that step.”
(And yes, there are people who don’t have to do it in quite so much detail, but don’t compare yourself to them. It’s not useful. And I suspect most people do have to do something like this, although some do it more in their head than others. I’m guessing, from how you sound similar to me, that you need to do it out on paper, as I do.)
I did my doctorate in 6 years at the top school in my discipline. And of course, every discipline has its peculiarities, so I would not assume that my experiences are translatable.
I would say that everyone in my program had a different experience. There were the cool, calm, collected types that exercised, ate well, did community service, and took vacations every summer. There were those who were mentally decimated after coursework, or bad advising relationships, or having their dissertation proposals ravaged. But it’s a journey. I knew one guy in a cursory way. He got done in about three and a half years, and I thought to myself, “Wow, he’s a genius.” And he probably was. But he was also married with four kids… and the deal was that he would knock out the doctorate while he went nuts with research, so he could get a good job. His wife would manage the household in the interim. It’s fair to say his motivation was pretty powerful. Most of my friends (including me) didn’t have kids in school, at least not until the dissertation stage.
The first thing I’d say is, what are you aiming to do post-doctorate? Academia? Job in industry? If it’s the latter and you’re at a good school, nobody is going to give a shit about what happened on your way to commencement. If it’s the former, generally, if you are seeking out a tenure track position at a peer or lower tiered institution, you should be fine. It gets difficult if you’re at a good but not great grad program and you want to teach at a top-flight institution.
I always tell my advisees to take a step back from the process and constantly assess it. It’s supposed to be challenging, but not to the point that it breaks you mentally, physically, or spiritually. If that’s happening, something’s out of balance. And it might be your sense of perspective. If all you’re focusing on is your work, everything seems much more significant than it really is. This is how paranoia sets in.
My adviser was a very busy person, and perfectly nice, but just didn’t have time for unprepared folks. So a lot of people started saying she was super hardcore, mean, etc. and the reality was, she had her own career to advance. If you were wasting her time, that was a bad thing. So if she blew you off it wasn’t a personal thing; you just had to come back next time better organized and let her know exactly what she needed to do to help you.
So I would say: a) get some perspective, b) don’t take most of this stuff personally, and c) find a way to balance your life out. Sounds like the guy you mentioned was able to do that. But you don’t have to be a genius or rich to follow those three steps.
Just to add, I just finished a manuscript with a colleague and we have a quote from an AAUP report about academia - it’s something like, “Faculty tend to be overachievers, and tend to compare their work quality and output to the giants in the field.” Which of course is problematic, because we all can’t be giants.
I was one of the “favored” students, I suppose, in my program. I had good funding, presentations and publications, well-liked by the faculty, etc. but I generally walked around thinking that I was so much less fortunate than the most favored students. I needed some perspective, and it came mostly from my students that I TA’ed. They thought I was a leader, doing great, etc. and when I usually started to come back and say, “Yeah, but that was a book, not a peer-reviewed article,” or something like that, they would say, “Well, most people don’t even have that.” Good point.
Which is not to say you shouldn’t hold yourself to a high standard, and strive to do more. And I think we all feel rattled and insecure in grad school - nothing about grad school really helps you feel secure, does it? But your career is not resting on your performance on one paper, or one article. It’s cumulative. And if you’re successful more often than you are not, the bird’s eye view is that you are successful. But the nature of academic work is to grimly accept your successes and worry about your next step, and wallow in the failures. It’s not balanced at all, and it isn’t part of our nature to be “happy” with where we are. That’s why I spent more time with my friends who were in other (non-academic) fields - they seemed to respect what I was doing, which made me realize it was probably more important that I gave myself credit for.
There are some great comments so far.
I must look like that guy. I am somewhat overactive in my program, consult in the private sector on the side for about 20 hours per week, and have a wife and newborn. I dress professionally around school and am never in a hurry. My colleagues have told me that yes, I make it look too easy. So since I am kind of that guy, perhaps I can share something useful.
First, I had a decade between undergrad and my PhD program (through an intervening MA halfway in between). I learned a lot of polish and discipline between then and now. I worked some high-stress and faced-paced jobs in which very large amounts of money were at stake. Among other things, the business relied on my econometric analysis to make some pretty large decisions. That is pressure of a somewhat different order of magnitude than what I face now. So whenever I find myself on the verge of getting bent out of shape, I just remind myself that I didn’t leave a great career at megacorp to let school, which I absolutely love, get me down. I spent years trying to arrange my life so I could go back to school, and am going to love every minute of it. It is a real privilege.
Looking easy does not mean that it is easy. I do wake up early and often start working at 6 or 6:30 AM. I have no weekends or days off. But as a rule I also never work past midnight. I usually wrap up by 8:30 or so. This is not easy and I pay a price for it. But if I were not in control of my work all the time, my life would quickly get backed up and everything would fall apart. I always feel like I am walking the razor’s edge, so quite frankly, it is hard. It only looks easy to other people because I have had plenty of time and incentive to practice.
I also try never to beat up on myself after I have had an unproductive day. I try to tap out before I feel myself spinning my wheels. Both of these things happen fairly often. There are plenty of days where I just can’t figure something out a passage in some text, I don’t understand a result, hit a research dead end, etc. I could easily spend hours (or days) in a funk telling myself how stupid I am and that I have no future in academia. After all, it’s often how I feel. Instead I try to leave myself tasks I can do on off-days. If I’m doing very badly, then it’s a good time to catch up on bibliographies, or write a brief reaction paper to the book I read last week to go in my files, perhaps translate some stuff for practice, etc. I don’t just dig holes and fill them but I try to do things I know will be time-saving later. I’ve saved myself countless hours by doing self-esteem boosting jobs when I can’t hack the hard stuff. When I am finally on a tear in my research, the last thing in the world I want to do is put together a bibliography because the paper is due in three days.
Plan to give yourself opportunities so that when you are kicking ass, you can really take advantage of it. The boring but useful jobs are good for the off-days to boost your self-esteem.
For the love of god, take care of yourself. I play video games as a reward when I’ve been good. If strenuous exercise feels bad, then just download an audio book of a novel and go for a walk. My body and brain require a lot of care and feeding; if I don’t do that, there is no fucking way I can do quality work. I’ve got to keep myselt conditioned for the long haul. I view it like I’m training for a marathon, though to be honest, I don’t much care for long distance running. But no doubt you get the idea.
Please feel free to PM me if you want to talk more personally.
Edited to add: Definitely listen to Hippy Hollow. I think he’s absolutely dead on.
And one more thing. It is not all about me. I have a marvelous home life and a very supportive wife who is actually pretty interested in what I do. I would not be able let alone motivated to do what I do if it were not for her.
Well, Hippy Hollow, I’ve long since written off going to a top-tier university. I just don’t have the stuff for it. I have no publications, and am just simply not fast enough with reading or writing to publish a lot of A+ work. I also am just basically too lazy to do what it takes to get tenure at those places. I’ll be lucky to find a job, much less one at a good school.
BTW, how do you find so much time to be on the 'Dope and be so prolific? That’s an honest question, no snark. I just can’t switch gears that fast. To be as prolific as you, I would have to work 24/7.
I guess I should go ahead and tell the whole story. My degree is in stats, but it’s technically through a business college. I don’t have a mathematics course on my transcript; I’ve taken all graduate stats courses, and have had to teach myself enough math to make it through. I barely got Bs in both of my math stat courses, but made A’s in the others. The reason I have been able to get so far is that the degree requirements for my program don’t technically require a mathematics background. I fell through a giant crack in the system. So the impostor syndrome might actually apply to me.
Everyone is right, though, that I need perspective. I have basically 0 close friends, and the acquaintances I do have I can’t stand being around because they remind me of school. I have a girlfriend, but she lives two hours away (long story).
And **Maeglin, **it’s interesting you mention video games. That is the one thing in my life right now that gives me pleasure. Some of the happiest memories I have are of 9th grade, playing Final Fantasy VII and Resident Evil. Really. When I do have a chance to play, which is rarely because I work under a constant pall of guilt about not doing something, for the few hours I have with it, life is bearable. I’m happy. But then when it’s time to put it away, or when I’ve beaten the game and there aren’t any new one’s out that I’m interested in, I feel sad, as if a friend has gone away.
I know. I’m pathetic.
statsman1982, may I make another suggestion? If you find yourself wondering if you’re going to get a job teaching at a top university or just a second-rate one where you’ll have to do so much teaching that you can’t do research, why not look for a job as a statistician in industry or in government after you finish your Ph.D.? In fact, I have a suggestion about where you can look for such a job. Please send me a private message and we’ll talk about this.
statsman, do you want to do research for your career, or teach, or both? Because if you want to teach only, then IMHO you should avoid the large research universities and look at teaching colleges, liberal arts schools, and (gasp!) community colleges. I think you need to retain some perspective about your colleagues who compare teaching schools to burger-flipping: these are guys who want to go into research and view a professorship as a way to do that, with the caveat that they’ll have to get up in the morning and deliver a lecture.
(This is why I don’t understand why anyone goes to huge research universities for their first years of undergrad; you either get a researcher who doesn’t want to teach, or a harried grad student who has never taught. You can get all the same 101s at a school where there are profs who like teaching, and you don’t have to sit in lectures of 500 people. But that’s a rant for another day.)
You might want to investigate community colleges. Some of them will even hire non-Ph.D. as adjuncts; it’s a good way to get started.
Thanks, Wendell Wagner. The problem is, I really love teaching. I’m teaching this semester, in fact, because my advisor pulled some strings and really thought it would be good for my CV. I’ve only actually ever taught stats one other time (because of my weird place in the business school). Honestly, if I had to do a 4/4 teaching load, I don’t think I’d mind. Hell, I’ve taught two hour-and-a-half classes back to back before, and I didn’t break a sweat. I get good evals too (average is 4.5 out of 5). I’ve even gotten a doctoral student teaching excellence award.
But…I want to teach college students, and I would like some job security. Hence the desire to get the PhD.
I’m training to be (among other things) a game theorist and my dirty non-secret is that I don’t actually have any real background in math, either. There is no phrase I dislike more than “it’s trivial,” because I know it will take me hours to work through. It’s a terrible feeling. How I got here is an unlikely story, but I won’t bore you with the details.
For what it’s worth, I’m working to get that background. In addition to my normal work I am taking additional math courses every semester just to firm up my foundation. Even my advisors think I’m a little nutty: spending huge amounts of time taking exotic derivatives or whatever has no social science content in it whatsoever. But they also don’t know what it’s like to feel paralyzed by one’s lack of skills.
Of course, all the time spent on math is not time spent on honing my language skills for my five language proficiency exams. So it bears repeating: looking easy != being easy.
I completely understand your attitude about video games. It’s taken a long time but I have mostly been able to transform playing games from a go-to for regular stress relief to an occasional reward. It’s probably grist for another coversation, though.
I’ve pretty much decided to quit a PHD programme. I couldn’t hack it.I wouldn’t mind but I fronted my own money on it too. It was all such a waste of time and money. 
Sorry. I think we were posting at the same time.
It’s not that I don’t want to do any research ever. It’s just that I love teaching far more. I never feel exhausted after teaching (actually, it energizes me), but I’m easily mentally exhausted just reading some of the stuff I have to read.
I have decided that small schools are definitely on my radar. I’ve written off the big schools as career possibilities. It just wouldn’t work for me.
Which language(s) are you trying to be proficient in, 'cause you sure-as-hell are proficient in English. 