Re: Regarding success, sense of self-worth and finding a purpose
What follows is an excerpt from a private exchange. I am sharing it with the permission of my correspondent, without revealing their personal details. The quoted/indented parts are those I am replying to. I asked to publish this because I think it can be useful to many people.
Today I write to you not regarding anything related to emacs but rather wish to seek your advice on a matter that is of utmost importance in my life. I am currently in the academic field having graduated with a master’s about a year ago and am seeking for PhD positions within a field of my interest. Long story short, I’ve been unsuccessful in my applications so far, which has made me question my abilities and future prospects within academia.
Of course, when I mention this to people they tell me to persevere and keep applying but honestly I feel just exhausted and sometimes ponder if it is time to throw in the towel. During my master’s I had a strong desire to pursue a PhD and end up as an academic, with big goals (not awards per se but simply to satiate my intellectual curiosity) in mind. With the concurrent rejections I keep receiving, I have begun to doubt my abilities of which I perhaps overestimated before. My current job is within academia but it is only temporary, with my contract running out in about two months. I currently have no job prospects lined up, which has made me contemplate the next steps that I need to take.
It is understandable that you question yourself. The facts do not align with your expectations, so taking the time to understand what is going on is important. Self-reflection and the requisite constructive criticism can help you correct your course and find something that is benign for you.
Though note that self-criticism can also be unfair, such as in the case of assuming the full burden of responsibility for this state of affairs you are describing. It may be that you do not have the skills to pursue this career. Or you have the skills but are in the wrong place at the wrong time. Or there may even be some other factor, such as your interests being too niche or too mainstream. There are lots of possibilities. Remember then not to attribute everything that is happening to your self only and to tell yourself narratives like “I did not get the position because I am a failure”.
Those kinds of narratives are too simplistic and end up being unfair on the person who formulates them. Several things can be true at the same time, which means that it is not helpful to frame this matter as one of “ability versus inability [for a PhD programme]”. I think it is better to say that you cannot know for sure what the reason is—and even if there is a clearly discernible reason to begin with—so given this uncertainty, it is premature to reach conclusions about your own worth.
You will still need to adapt, but you do it without loathing your self. Some things are not meant to be and it ultimately is irrelevant why that is. What matters in the moment you are in is to deal with what you have. The idea that a person’s self-worth is measured by how well they accomplish their goals is problematic because the person does not control all the relevant factors. Moreover, in this case there is a presumption that the person sets out goals that are necessarily aligned with their abilities. But why should we assume this to be true? Someone can set out to do something that does not work for them. If, for example, I try my best to out-compete an elite basketball player and fail in the process, I did not lose my worth but only realised that my ambition was not consistent with my potential. I have thus liberated myself from a false want. This has nothing to do with my worthiness.
I understand you are feeling lost, though consider the possibility that this is in part because you yourself narrowed your options by wanting only this path in your life. It does not mean that alternatives do not exist or that you cannot be competent and valued at something else. To be concrete, the notion that intellectual curiosity is satisfied through a PhD programme is partially true but also partially restricting: you can still be inquisitive, dubitative, and sceptical without that formal capacity. It is the person who has those qualities, not the role/title.
Several moons ago I wanted to follow the path that leads to the academia. I was of the view that this was the natural telos of someone with my kind of intellectual inclinations. For a variety of reasons this did not happen. I was initially blaming myself, until I realised this was a biased, narrow-minded perspective. Then I understood the futility of this endeavour, of me criticising my ostensible worthlessness, but also discerned it was a self-invigorating cycle: I had developed tunnel vision by only wanting one outcome and then I was feeling there is darkness all around when it was my tunnelling that was causing it, not the surrounding reality actually being dark.
If you can find a job in the academia, do it. If not, muster the courage to move on. Whatever the case, it will serve you well to decouple the job-searching component of it from the intellectual sensitivities you have. When you check the technicalities involved in an academic’s life, you may find lots of patterns that do not appeal to you, such as the administrivia of everyday university matters and the grinding business of scientific publishing. Even as a PhD, you will be doing a job that may not necessarily fulfil you and, depending on the specifics, may even reduce your enthusiasm for the things you do like about that field.
By seeing every form of employment as employment, you will be able to broaden your horizons. The stakes will be lower, because your intellectual life and well-being will not depend on the job itself. Whereas now they are all tied together in your mind and this can feel overwhelming. “Normal” jobs will not deny you of your intelligence and your innate curiosity. They may actually give you the opportunity to take a step back from what you are used to, which can help you have a more rounded understanding of your experience.
In my past, I did jobs like bartending and construction work. There is nothing particularly “intellectual” about serving the Nth cocktail to the drunks on the bar or carrying twenty kilos of concrete up and down the stairs. Like every other kind of employment, these kept me going. They also revealed to me aspects of human life I was not familiar with and, by extension, helped me see the bigger picture in my life. I did not become any less philosophical by doing such work. Maybe they are not flattering on a CV, but this is a problem only if you think in terms of the CV being the thing that flatters you instead of your quality as a person, which others appreciate once they get to know you.
One part of my mind tells me to keep applying, even if it means staying jobless for a while. Another part tells me to be realistic with my expectations and to get a “normal” job in my home country (I currently reside abroad for this temporary job), but that would mean negating all of my efforts so far in the hopes of finding a PhD. This has made me conflicted and I wish I could find some clarity in my life.
I feel extremely hopeless at this point and would like to ask for your advice on this matter. If I do eventually decide to get the “normal” job, forgoing any aspirations for a PhD, I feel like I’ll only be a former husk of myself, with no purpose in life fueling me.
Are these mutually exclusive? Can you not get some job now and continue trying for a PhD? If you see these as an “either/or” kind of deal, then you are forcing yourself to make an emotionally hard decision. Compounding this is the incorrect notion that the PhD is the sole conduit to intellectuality, so losing that is, understandably, a really big problem.
Here I want to point out a tendency we have with matters we hold dear. We identify with our pet projects/ideas/plans to the point where we think that if we lose them, we lose our self in the process. Again, this raises the stakes too high and makes every decision extremely difficult. But why insist on that kind of association? Why make our sense of self and of our concomitant wellness hinge on something we cannot control? Why can we not be more adaptable, preserving the kernel of quality we have while trying to make it fit in evolving states of affairs? What if, for instance, your skills are valuable in some industrial or entrepreneurial context? Maybe there is something there that you will eventually like, even if it now seems unappealing due to how invested you are in your current goal.
I think we can adapt and can find fulfilment even in places/employment/people we would never have thought of as possible before. To do this, we need to take a step back from the fray, allow other experiences to unfold, and not insist on the “all or nothing” kind of deal that is our singular present desire. There are too many possibilities in this world and it is a pity to not appreciate any of them because of some long-preconceived aspiration.
To make matters worse, I keep seeing my peers and people younger than me getting excellent PhD positions while I feel like I’ve been left behind with nothing to show for myself. Even though I know I shouldn’t compare myself to others, I can’t seem to help it.
Yes, this is disheartening. Though, again, there can be many plausible explanations for this phenomenon. It does not prove that you are worthless (nor that they are worthy for that matter). Maybe they get those positions because their particular area of interest is more marketable or happens to have more vacancies. Maybe they get those positions because the college needs to meet some quota of social inclusivity. Or maybe there is some form of collusion or discrimination involved.
You will never be certain of what the cause is. Better withhold judgement about it and open yourself up to whatever possibilities life brings you. If you conclude that all this is happening for the one and only reason that you are supposedly not worthy, then I think you are being simplistic and ultimately wrong.
Finally, I imagine there is also a sense of pride involved. Like what you will tell your family and friends back home. This is a source of pressure, for sure, though consider how you will be inviting scrutiny if you dwell too much on this point, keep being apologetic about it, and continue beating yourself up for it. Sometimes things do not work out the way we had planned. And sometimes we lack the requisite perspective to appreciate the little things that end up being more important to us than whatever lofty targets we were originally aiming at.
Good luck with everything and remember to take it easy!