Dealing with Jealousy

Graduate school is a closed system.  When you are in it you feel that you will never leave, and you constantly compare yourself to other students.

When you quit, prepare for some of your friends to be jealous.  When you get a job, prepare for them to be jealous.  Even if you stay, prepare for them to be jealous when you finish your comp exams, or file your dissertation.  It isn't even their fault--the environment itself is toxic and many faculty actively encourage deep competition between students that can lead to alienation and an inability to understand that someone else's success isn't coming at your expense.

That's why it is so important to make friends and build yourself a network.  Everyone struggles with graduate school, so study groups, fellow graduate student friends, and support from your fellow Teaching Assistants is critical. Some programs are incredibly cut throat, and I know some of you cannot find a friendly face in your program. If that is the case, look to buddy up with graduate students in other departments.  You need people you can vent to, look to for advice, and count on for emotional support and advice navigating your program.  You need peers more than ever.

Sometimes you can find these people at seminars, in coursework outside your department, or with others who are interested in similar research to you.  Sometimes they are ahead of you in your program (which is always helpful!), or even junior faculty.  If all else fails look for local meet ups, book clubs, or even join a casual sports team. 

And try to be supportive yourself. It's easy to feel jealous of other's success, but it's a lot less lonely to celebrate with them.

Welcome Back to School!

It's fall, and that means two things.  Students heading back to school, and students realizing that those schools and graduate programs might not be the best fit for them.  Every year I see my traffic spike over the fall months.  Some of us knew that first day that the program we selected wasn't right for us. For others, the doubts grow over the months and even years.

Regardless of your situation, Welcome!  You are not alone.  Know that there are many who feel the same way you do--and that some go on to both finish their programs and land academic jobs, while others quit and never look back.

If you're new to the site, check out some of my more popular posts.  If you're back again for the umpteenth time and still struggling for answers, check out my 85% rule, and my five year update!

Doubts on Leaving Grad School 

Should you Leave or Stick it Out? 

Standing by the 85% Rule

Giving Notice: How to Exit Graduate School Gracefully

Giving Notice:  How to Gracefully Exit out of Graduate School Part II

Advice for Foreign Graduate Students 

What I Really Learned in Graduate School Even Though I Quit 

Quitting Grad School as My Best Life Decision

December 2017 marked the fifth anniversary of my quitting graduate school. 

It was an anniversary that came and passed, but I frankly took no notice of that because I was a little preoccupied I gave birth to my daughter. Quitting grad school is the best decision I’ve ever made in my life. It’s so clear in retrospect it was time for me to leave my program even though at the time it was a difficult and complicated decision. 

Quitting has been fantastic for my career. At the time I left my grad school program I calculated I was 10 years behind my peers who had chosen to go straight into their career fields. It took me three years after leaving, two jobs, and a lucky break to catch up to them in terms of salary. Within the last two years I’ve been able to work my way into a mid-level job with a good salary base that is well beyond what I would be making as a assistant professor. My husband and I bought house in a high cost of living area, contribute to retirement, bought and paid off a car and were finally able to make forward progress on our life goals. 

But it’s not just the money. I realize now that if I had stayed to finish the PhD I would have felt compelled to take a job that required the credential even though I’ve come to realize that a lot of the research and analyst positions I thought I wanted were not in any way a good fit for me or even something I desired. That’s not to say that everything is awesome--there are still challenges and everyone makes compromises. I know in the long-term I’m interested in consulting and working for myself and that a whole new round of transitions will be necessary to do that. But quitting has given me the perspective that I can walk away when something isn’t working and be just fine. 

It is amazing to look back at how far I’ve come in last five years and when I look at my daughter I realize how important it is to build the life you want because you’re the only one who has to live it. We put so much pressure on ourselves and allow others to put pressure on us, too, but ultimately success in life comes down to being willing and able to determine what you want and go for it.  Not everyone needs to quit but if you feel the call, if you’re floundering, failing or even succeeding but miserable, you owe it to yourself to have the tough conversation. Be honest even when it’s uncomfortable and even when it’s scary to face decisions and be an active participant in shaping the future you want for yourself. 

That said, my experience is not going to be your experience. But I hope at least by sharing my perspective that I can be helpful to some of you. I took so much comfort in finding others online who had similar experiences to myself and who had been brave enough to leave. When you find yourself searching for an answer that you cannot seem to find the answer to, you have to look to yourself. 

Good luck!

How to Pitch Grad School for a Management Job

Ok, so you've finally decided to it's ok to quit your program, but you're freaking out about how you will put food on the table.  First, the good news is that as a graduate student you are very likely making under the federal poverty level, which means pretty much any job will pay better.  I still remember when my therapist asked me what was the worst thing possible that could happen if I quit, and I answered working at Starbucks.  Hello, working full-time at Starbucks provides more money and better health care than most graduate students receive, so don't worry--pretty much any job will be an improvement if it brings a pay check instead of more loans.

Second, don't underestimate the value of your graduate school training, no matter how worthless you feel your degree may be.  You basically went to college twice as long as most entry level employees, and you presumably picked up some analytical writing and critical reasoning skills that should come in quite handy. At the very least your learned to bullshit your way through discussions of long, boring articles you probably didn't read, which means you will be able to handle impromptu questions from customers and bosses with ease.

Most importantly, if you ever did research or managed a research team of undergraduates, you can easily claim management experience which is more than many of the bosses I have subsequently worked for ever did.  Guiding a group of people toward a common goal, ensuring everyone is coding consistently and keeping up with deadlines, facilitating research meetings, and writing up findings with a number of authors are all great resume worthy skills that you should be highlighting.  Because you may not have known it, but those are all management skills that you should be pitching in interviews.  While it helps to have managed paid staff, the secret is that any management, even of interns and free labor, can be considered when it comes to hiring.

I would also point out that escaped graduate students make some of the best employees.  We're highly motivated, smart,  but also practical enough to know when to call it quits, and generally desperate to get out there into the world and earn a paycheck.  Yes, sometimes we are an arrogant bunch, and we can be bored and under stimulated in many jobs.  But we write well, and quickly.  We love our 9-5 schedule. but don't shrink from deadlines, or have an issue with needing to put in more time and effort.  We survived harsh working conditions and miserable emotionally deadening slogs through material denser than anything you will ever encounter in the corporate world.  Departmental politics are a more than adequate training ground for office politics.

For a lot of managers, the secret in hiring is escaped graduate students.  And I can tell you from personal experience that a lot of the hiring managers are themselves students who bailed on the Ph.D. I always take a second look when I see a resume come across from someone that didn't finish.  Because sometimes the best person for the job is a non-traditional candidate who knew when to call it quits. 

Creative Destruction

"You cannot create a new life without destroying the one you've got." -Martha Beck

Quitting graduate school is a tough decision.  I know of no one who quit who didn't agonize over the decision and whether it was right for them.  But when you are finally ready to make the decision of whether to stay or quit, it is easy to delude ourselves into thinking it really isn't a decision at all.

Change is hard.  But even harder is saying good bye and firmly closing the door behind us.  Once I made my decision I remember the ease with which I was able to tender my resignation, quit the program and head off into the outside world.  It was an intense, surreal two week period that after the months of anxiety ruminating over whether I should stay or go felt like flying.

Yet even as I left I chose not to file the final forms to quit. I left the door open, which provides a very smart safety net, but also can keep you from moving forward.  I realized a few days ago that I have now been out of graduate school as long as I was in it.  Three and a half years is a lot of time in your late twenties/early thirties, and I have to say that I have not regretted leaving even once. 

The Decision Trap and Creativity

Every day we put a lot of pressure on ourselves to make the right decisions.  Eat healthy, save money, say the right thing.  As women we face the unrealistic societal expectation expressed by my boss' favorite comedian of going to work, taking care of the kids, and then coming home to cook a great meal, and be multiorgasmic.  Life is a series of decisions, and the unrelenting pressure we place on ourselves to make the best ones.

At least most life decisions are easier
than  solving this glittery rubik's cube

Yet research indicates the human brain eventually suffers from decision fatigue. Making good decisions  is easier when you can make fewer of them.  That's why Steve Jobs and Mark Zuckerberg where the same outfit every day.   To paraphrase Barack Obama you don't want to have to worry about what you are eating or wearing when you have so many other decisions to make.   Smart women can do this, too.

I don't wear the same outfit every day, but to the extent possible, I've tried to automate the things I don't care about, and focus my energy and attention on the things that do.  I want a cleaner house, but I don't actually want to clean it so I read Living a Simple Life and The Life Changing Magic of Tidying Up and got rid of stuff.   My husband and I live where we can walk downtown so we get our exercise without having to motivate ourselves to get off our couch to do boring mindless laps around a suburban block.   I want to write and be creative, but I realized some months ago most of my creativity was going into cooking and choosing what to wear each day rather than my writing, so I made some adjustments.  When my life seems most off track, I will make a list of my values and priorities, then make a list of how I actually spend my time:  there is nothing like comparing the two to see where an adjustment is needed.

Seeing the results of how you spend your time and the life you live contrasted with the life you actually want for yourself, and the ways you currently spend your time can make achieving your dreams seem impossible.  How did you end up here?  Why should things be any different?  Maybe this is who you really are.  All of these thoughts make the life you want seems so far away.  But the reality is that you can use the fact that life is a series of decisions to your advantage, too:

Terence J. Tollaksen wrote that his purpose became clearer once he began to recognize the “decision trap”: “This trap is an amazingly consistent phenomena whereby ‘big’ decisions turn out to have much less impact on a life as a whole than the myriad of small seemingly insignificant ones.”

You don't get where you want to be by making one big choice.  Life is made up of the smaller choices we make every day.  So don't sweat it if you aren't where you want to be.  Spend some time thinking about where you are, and what you want.  Then start spending time doing what you want, and look for the small decisions that can help you get there.  All these little decisions will make it so when you do have a big decision to make, you'll be ready.  And if you are still overwhelmed, just remember the 85% rule:  You don't have to be 100% certain, or even 100% ready. In fact, you probably never will be;  content yourself with being 85% certain, and when you get to 85% give yourself permission to act.

Gratitude Adjustment

My husband came home from a trip a few days ago, and when we had our first fight he said "Being away for all these weeks I really forgot how negative you are." We said a bunch of other stuff, too, but that statement really stuck with me.  Am I too negative?  Do I criticize too much?  I had been in a pretty spectacular mood.  "You are not a miserable person," he reassured me.   "I just think you spent too much time with your mother while I was gone."

As annoyed as I was with him, when I tuned in to my own frequency I realized he might have a point.  Yes, I was having a streak of particularly bad work days, but I also caught myself in what seemed like a metronome of negativity: the steady, rhythmic beat of annoyed this and muttering that.   "This person is an idiot," I thought while driving.  "Move your ass, lady, you're standing in line wrong." It wasn't just my negativity but my Germanic sense that there was an exact right way for the world to do everything, and the world just wasn't up to the task.

Ok, we're laying down the marker.  Knock it off. 

"What if I stop complaining for 24 hours?"  I thought to myself.  "How about making like Oprah and practicing gratitude?"  Except the more I thought about strapping myself into a monastic system of habit change, the more I started to worry that cultivating perfection was in fact the last thing I needed.  What does it mean to practice self-help when you are an unhinged control freak?  Is the paleo diet really about eating like my ancestors, or my need to control everything on my plate?  Does not complaining for 24 hour silence the negative tape in my head, or is it just another more socially acceptable way of suppressing myself?  Do I need to restrict, or obsess anymore than I already do? Isn't the obsessing what is causing all this in the first place?

So I decided to keep it simple. I gave up complaining for 24 hours. It was one minute after my decision when I sent my first snarky tweet questioning the whole project, and 10 hours before I came up with a coping mechanism borrowed from my Southern relatives that involved saying something that sounded nice, but was really a passive aggressive dig.

I don't think I was very successful at not complaining, and realized I really don't want to add "bless your heart" to every other sentence out of my mouth, but at least I've slowed the negativity somewhat.  In fact, instead of avoiding the negative, I decided to focus on the positive and start a gratitude journal.  Every day I will write down things I am thankful for.  It may not seem like much at first, but each positive thought can build on the last.

Tonight, I'm thankful for this blog. I am thankful I am writing again, even though no one sees it.  Most of all, I'm thankful for my voice--which has been too silent, too hidden, and ignored for too long.

The Stress of Being a Breadwinner

I know it may seem hard to believe when you are living in poverty as a graduate student, but one day you will leave the University and you will have a job.  You will be getting paid. And you may or may not find yourself getting paid more than your partner.  Notice I say getting paid 'more than your partner," and not "getting paid a lot." You may or may not get paid a lot. But if you find yourself in the breadwinner position, you better hope you are getting paid a lot.

Just Another Day at the Office

Still Standing By the 85% Rule

If you are finding this blog late at night, I know exactly what advice you need--the 85% Rule. Stop fretting, worrying, googling the same keywords so many times you realize you have read everything on the Internet ever written about your problem.  

Most of all, stop worrying about making decisions with 100% certainty!

Step One

Quiet your mind.  Meditate, take a break.  Read Zen Habits. 

Step Two

When you feel 85% confident about your decision, act on it.

Life is not about certainty. If you wait until you are ready, you will be dead. It will never happen.  So stop letting the perfect be the enemy of the good, and let the good be good enough.

Step Three

Let the synchronicity begin...

Can't Figure Out Your Future? Maybe You Don't Want a Job or a Career

When I quit grad school back in 2012 I did a lot of soul searching regarding what kind of job and career I wanted for myself. There was a significant amount of time spent taking aptitude tests and finding careers that would be the right fit. I left for a policy job that involved a significant community outreach component. It was great for me on so many levels because I got to use what I learned in grad school, but I also felt like I was out in the world making a difference.  Only I was massively overqualified and after a year and a half I was recruited to another job that is for all intents and purposes a massive step up: better pay and benefits, better hours, no weekends, better title, much more responsibility, and a great learning opportunity and resume booster. This new job catches me up career wise for all the years I missed out on when I was in graduate school and not working.  This new job is hands down leaps and bounds better. Like a gift that fell in my lap.

And yet, after eight months I am bored.  Bored, lonely, and depressed about the fact that I am stuck at a desk all day, grinding out reports and budgets and projects. I feel like I am not able to be myself, and that I have lost track of what I want out of life.  I feel like I do not fit in, and that I don't really want to.  I recognized these feelings.

I started looking at job postings, and surfing listings, and I went back to my therapist who I hadn't seen since I quit graduate school.  Every session we would talk through job possibilities and what my ideal career looked like. Nothing felt right. Suddenly, one day she looked at me: "You have spent the last few years intensely focused on your career: do you still want that to be your main focus?"

She was right. I realize I don't actually want a new job, or a career right now. I've been so focused on leaving grad school and getting a J-O-B and getting my career back on track, when really what I want to focus on now is being happy and getting a L-I-F-E.  

Grad school and work can feel so all consuming. But life isn't only about grad school and work.  Life is about family, and friends, and having experiences and making sure that you are doing what makes you you.  Life is short and when you look back on it from your death bed what you did for a job is going to matter less than if you feel what you did mattered, and that you lived the life you wanted.

So I know that right now my solution isn't simply to find a better job: instead I need to find a better life. Maybe that is with this job, maybe it is in another.  Regardless, what job I have is secondary to what life I want to live.

If you find yourself struggling to figure something out, maybe you need to pause and ask yourself if the question you are asking is even one to which you need an answer.  Maybe you need tostop, and ask a different question.