I’ve been trying for the past ten years or so to come to terms with my mediocrity.
I don’t know about anybody else, but this did make me feel better.
I feel mediocre largely because I dropped out of grad school in astronomy with only a master’s degree. But if I’d gotten a Ph.D, I’d probably have felt obligated to get a faculty job. Mr. Neville has gone this route, so I get a front-row seat to see what it’s like. From where I sit, it appears to kind of suck. He works a lot more than I do for not much more money.
Speaking of things that suck, make sure you’re not going to grad school just because you don’t know what else to do, or because you think you should. The only thing that will get you through the long hours and laughable pay is if you really, really love your subject. At least not knowing of anything else to do and thinking I should be in grad school weren’t enough to get me through more than a couple of years.
There’s a lot of wisdom in this. Myself, I revel in my mediocrity, so maybe that’s why I’m so happy. That and having found one person whom I managed to fool into thinking I’m special. That’s really all you need.