Wednesday, February 13, 2013

Fear is the Enemy of Productivity

While it is still the beginning of the semester, I already feel exhausted and burnt out. I have felt on the verge of tears everyday for the past week, between working on my conference paper and trying to keep up with everything and everyone. I wake up every morning, look at my to-do list and instantly feel exhausted. This is a major problem and I have been wrestling with myself to figure out what is wrong with me.

Last semester, I discovered that I was procrastinating on major projects (like my 510 20 page historiography) because I was afraid. I was so afraid that I sucked that I would just put off work until it was absolutely necessary. I am not doing that this semester but the fear that I was fighting last semester is still there, hindering my creativity and productivity.

Why am I so afraid of failure or making a mistake or needing improvement. I seriously cried/slept for half a day because my favorite professor gave me criticism that I just could not understand. My fear has not only made me lazy but has also destroyed my ability to understand what I am supposed to do. This perpetuates this cycle of fear.

But why is failure or making a mistake so frowned upon in our society? I understand that you do not want to make a mistake when it comes to things involving people (like bridges or buildings), but why are the stakes so high? My professors still get criticism and yet it seems like as a graduate student making a mistake is the worst thing. Criticism means that you can still improve and grow. It means that I still have purpose. One of the things that I love about what I do is that it is never done. There are new things to explore and new ways I can grow. I will always be working on my writing; I will never be perfect at writing and someone will always have suggestions as to how it can be better. The day that everyone says, "Oh this is perfect, " is the day I will be truly sad because it means one of two things: 1) I am finished and serve no purpose or 2) The person reviewing did not care enough to actually read it.

I know this in the idea that I am familiar with it (kennen auf Deutsch) but I do not have experiential knowledge (wissen auf Deutsch). I hope that as I try to remember these things that I will stop being so hard on myself. I am in progress and I need to be ok and understanding of this fact.

1 comment:

  1. I always take criticism very personally even when it isn't intended to be by the other party. Criticism can especially be painful when it comes from someone you greatly respect, as I assume is the case with your professor. However, when I get past my perceived attacks on my personality I find I start thinking critically and end up improving in whatever I was previously criticized in, or come to the conclusion the criticism is just not valid. It can be a tough pill to swallow at first but it is often for the better.

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