How do you find your passion?

As we transition into the holiday season in 2019 and spending more time with beloved ones, you’re likely to be asked some variation of the following question: “what are you going to do after you finish your postdoc?” As we reflect upon what comes next, we are often encouraged to “follow our passion.” This mantra gets a great deal of attention during commencement season… and when you are about to start a job search. As we’ve shared previously, your formal job search starts well before you read a job posting or submit your application. It starts with a critical assessment of your acquired knowledge, your skills, engagement with your network of colleagues and personal champions, and possibly and more importantly, a reflection on what really excites you. In other words, what is your passion, and what do you see yourself doing for the next phase of your career?

As suggested by Brad Stulberg and Steve Magness in The Passion Paradox,

“A better approach to finding your passion is to lower the bar from perfect to interesting, then give yourself permission to pursue your interests with an open mind.”

Many of us are perfectionists. However, when exploring different jobs and career paths, it’s OK to focus on something that excites you, if only for the time-being. Your passion for the job, the specific activity, and ultimately, the company’s overall mission may develop over time. If you find that you can get 100% on-board with this vision, great. If not, do you see enough that excites you to fulfill your career goals? And if not, that’s OK too… as long as you’re growing your skill set and your network, and gaining something to apply to your next career move. We like to draw the comparison to a research experiment. The best experiments are those that, no matter the result, give you actionable information. Can you use the info you learn in one career step to make a more impactful decision next time? As we noted last month’s newsletter, you will likely change jobs a number of times (an average of 12 times). Those transitions allow you to have multiple opportunities to re-evaluate your decisions and to make different and better-informed choices.

Additional advice comes from Dr. Jon M Jachimowicz in 3 Reasons It’s So Hard to “Follow Your Passion”,

“Don’t wait to find your passion.”

You should focus on developing a passion in parts of your job, understanding your colleague’s passion, and working together to pursue your passions together. This can happen either as part of your daily work or outside the confines of your research group or the larger university. If you focus on the people, the mission and the values, your passion will follow.

“Focus on what you care about, not just what’s fun.”

Aligning your efforts around what you value and the impact you can make will be more fulfilling than simply focusing on what’s fun. Clearly, you shouldn’t dread what you’re doing on a daily basis. However, if you’re committed to the company’s mission and values, then your passion with shine through.

“Take time to reflect.”

Your passion and motivation will change over time (and definitely throughout your careers). You should be open to these changes. Be sure to take time to re-evaluate what drives you… and look for new opportunities to evolve. With this mindset, you’ll be able to weather challenging situations and adapt to hardships.

As we enter a slower time in academia around the holidays, it’s a good time to spend some time focusing on YOU! In January 2020, we’ll share some ideas on how you can start to explore your different ‘passion projects’ while being a postdoc. For now, make time to recharge and reflect upon your success of the previous months, big or small. In addition, dedicate some time to think about what you want to do next… what is your passion? And how will you find what drives you?

Moving Past Perfectionism Into Wholeness

In this newsletter, we want to continue building on ways to cope with perfectionism by adding a few more ideas and strategies in support of your health and wellness as graduate students. Consider trying these out, and see what might work for you:

Feeling anxious. Often, perfectionism goes hand in hand with feeling anxious. For example, you may be pre-occupied with negative thoughts such as “I will never be good enough.” This is especially prevalent in academia where it can appear as though everyone else has gotten it all figured out. To manage this, try re-focusing your anxious thoughts and instead say to yourself, “I am working on this project one task at a time, and that is good enough.” Or “I don’t always have to be on top of things,” or even “My overall worth as a person is not defined by being an ‘excellent student’.” We know this is easier said than done, and yet just like with any life-long wellness strategy, it will take consistent, regular practice and setting yourself up with a wellness accountability partner or two.

Fearing failure. Ever spend too much time over-thinking and re-writing the same paragraph without going any further on a paper draft? Us too. Sometimes it’s fear of failure that keeps us stuck in a perfectionistic rut. Just like with any project, a way to move past getting stuck on writing is to set realistic and manageable goals for yourself. For example, rather than spending too much time on a single paragraph, try non-stop free writing for 15 minutes. While you are free writing, notice any perfectionistic feelings or thoughts but resist responding to or internalizing them. Stay engaged in your 15 minutes of writing, then take a five minute break. Then do another 15 minute round of writing; afterwards, you might have at least two paragraphs (and one or two ideas) to build your overall draft from. Doing manageable rounds of writing can help you see that you are making progress.

Resisting perfection. The stakes feel so high in grad school, especially when you feel like you are somehow “not smart enough”; when you are the first in your family to go to college let alone grad school; or when you don’t feel like you belong on campus. In these situations, you may feel the pressure to constantly prove yourself. Not only is this unrealistic and will impact your health in the long run: it is so far from the truth. While it’s important to be open to feedback from advisors and mentors in grad school so you can grow on intellectual and professional levels, it’s also important to let go of the need to be perfect for anyone. Mental health professional Ilene S. Cohen suggests several steps for letting go of perfection:

– Change your mindset. Resist the idea that you need to work hard in the hopes of gaining a person’s approval.
– Build self-reliance. Be open to failure and learn from trial and error.
– Learn to let go. Practice letting go of negative ideas you have about yourself.
– Make your own decisions. Trust in yourself to know what decisions are best for you.

Finally, working on undoing perfectionism also involves being in community. Reach out to trusted peers, loved ones and friends outside of academia, mentors and mental health professionals who can support your growth as a graduate student and your wellness as a whole person. Also, when you have the space and capacity to be supportive to your grad student peers, consider reaching out to let them know.

Best,

Core Programs—Office of Graduate Student Affairs
UW Graduate School

Learning to Let Go of Perfectionism in Grad School

I am a perfectionist by nature, but the professors have told us not to be that way in grad school. How do I shut it off? – Anonymous

Some of the content from this article was first published by Core Programs. It has been revised and updated.

Dear Anonymous,

Thanks for writing in! I applaud your self-awareness to know that perfectionism is part of your nature and something that may keep you from putting your best foot forward in graduate school. Please know that you are not alone in struggling with perfectionism. The culture of academia tends to promote the notion that your work is always under the toughest scrutiny, leaving little room for error or work that may be rough around the edges.

Your professors are likely telling you to let go of perfectionism because that mindset is extremely difficult to sustain in graduate school. Let’s consider why that may be true. For some students, perfectionism may lead to staying up all night to finish a paper, which — especially when done repeatedly — may be detrimental to their emotional and physical health. Other students may set goals that are impossible to reach which may lead to procrastination, avoidance and feeling not good enough.

I encourage you to shift your thinking so you can acknowledge yourself as a whole person. Four thoughts below may give you ideas for how to approach your work differently:

Accept – Perfectionism reduces you to the sum of what you can and can’t accomplish. The reality is you can’t do it all, and you can’t do it all perfectly. Be concrete and intentional in your goal setting each quarter, so you can do work that is manageable and meaningful to you. Adjust your goals as you go so you know what is really possible to accomplish now, this weekend or this week.
Invite – Perfectionistic thinking distorts the way you perceive the quality of your work and can contribute to isolation. Instead of feeling like you have to buckle down and work harder, make time to ask peers, faculty advisors and colleagues to talk through your work with you and help you to clarify your ideas. Framing something as a “work-in-progress” can take some pressure off. Knowledge production is a process, not a product. Nobody just “gets there” from sheer self-determination.
Ground – Perfectionism can perpetuate obsessive thinking on school or work-related projects. Intentionally spend time with friends, family and community who know you are more than just a graduate or professional student. Your community can help remind you that you are a partner, sibling, parent, friend, artist, dancer, gamer, hiker… the list goes on and on.
Enough – Accepting “this is enough” means that you have done the best you could given the time, experience and resources available, and it is time to be done. It also means you are enough, just as you are. Remember that intellectual and professional development are constant processes that require supportive feedback, self-revision and personal growth over time; you won’t get there all at once, and that’s OK!

I hope this gives you some ideas of how to move forward. I also want to leave you with additional resources that some of your fellow grad students have found helpful:

The Battle Between Perfectionism and Productivity: A Ph.D. student gives some well-tested advice for figuring out why you are struggling with perfectionism and how to cope with it.

How to Overcome Perfectionism: This tool from an anxiety-awareness organization in Canada gives steps for recognizing and coping with perfectionism.

This’ll Do: Kelly Edwards, associate dean of Student and Postdoctoral Affairs in the Graduate School, explains her family’s saying “this’ll do” and why she has carried it into the workplace.

As well, if you are still feeling overwhelmed or simply want more specific strategies for coping with perfectionism, I encourage you to consider short-term counseling with the UW Counseling Center. Managing academic stress as well as moods and thoughts are all topics appropriate for short-term counseling, according to the Counseling Center.

All the best,

The Grad School Guide

Ask the Grad School Guide is an advice column for all y’all graduate and professional students. Real questions from real students, answered by real people. If the guide doesn’t know the answer, the guide will seek out experts all across campus to address the issue. (Please note: The guide is not a medical doctor, therapist, lawyer or academic advisor, and all advice offered here is for informational purposes only.) Submit a question for the column →

Welcome All! Tips for Preparing for the Fall Quarter!

Core Programs in the Graduate School extends a warm welcome to all new and returning graduate and professional students to the UW—Bothell, Tacoma, and Seattle. Whether you are enrolled for a year, a few years, or several, we acknowledge that it takes time to settle into a new city, work rhythm, and culture. Even for those of us who have lived in the Pacific Northwest for many years, we are still discovering new places and making new connections.

For those of you who are returning to campus, we truly hope you had opportunities to re-energize during the summer so you can move forward with your academic, professional, and interpersonal goals. We also appreciate that many of you are dreaming about and planning for life beyond graduate and professional school.

At Core Programs, we are here to root you on and support you as you work towards your goals — #UWGradSuccess. Here are some tips we hope you find useful, as you prepare for the first week of the new quarter:

You don’t have to know everything. Your Graduate Program Advisors are doing a fantastic job of organizing departmental orientations and welcome events, and they are sharing a wealth of information about your program requirements and campus resources. This is important for you, so you can plan ahead for your academic and professional goals. At the same time, we encourage you to acknowledge that you don’t have to know everything right now. Prioritize only the most important information and tasks you need to learn and do now and make time to re-visit information about your program and campus resources later (next week, next month, next quarter, etc.) Use an Individual Development Plan (IDP), so you can set goals for yourself with notes like “explore…” or “find out about…”. It takes one step at a time to make progress and figure out what’s next. Be open and curious.

Find your community. The University of Washington is a big place, with three campuses and multiple offsite research locations. We know that a feeling of belonging is critical to your success as graduate and professional students. It makes a difference to find and connect with people that can support your whole self—and not just your role as a graduate or professional student. To help you find your community, check out the list below of upcoming welcome events and orientations.

Practice asking for help. Throughout your time at UW, seeking guidance and feedback on your studies, professional pursuits, and interpersonal goals is also vital to your success. The trick is knowing when and how to ask for help. Maybe you’re unsure if you’re critically engaging with course readings in the most effective and efficient ways. Be proactive, and send an e-mail to a second or third year student in your program, and ask if they can meet for coffee to go over your understanding of one of the readings. You might learn new study tips that will make your life easier. When you’re a new student, reaching out to a peer can be a more comfortable option rather than approaching faculty. Just remember that you were selected out of many applicants to be in your department, so know that you belong here.

You will be hearing from us every two weeks with these e-newsletters. Add cpinfo@uw.edu to your e-mail contacts, to make sure our newsletters arrive in your inbox. You’ll also be hearing from the Graduate School every other week with the Graduate School Digest–a fabulous collection of events, resources, and quick tips for making the most of your graduate student experience. Check out our Core Programs facebook page and the UW Graduate Student facebook page for more.

Best Regards,

Kelly, Jaye, and Ziyan
Core Programs Team

Ground Yourself These Last Few Weeks of the Quarter

We see how hard you’re working. You’re running here and there, juggling multiple responsibilities related to all aspects of who you are as a graduate or professional student. In the midst of this spring quarter chaos, we want to offer you some tips to help ground you in these last few weeks of the quarter.

Connect with your body. Feeling accumulated tension in your muscles? Are you having trouble keeping your energy up? Maybe you’ve been agitated the last few days. These are all signs that your body is stressed. We know this is common knowledge, but isn’t it interesting how we can easily ignore bodily feedback and try to plough through the day or week anyway? Try taking 10-15 minutes out of your day to connect with your body (this is very possible as we can easily spend 10 minutes on social media). Go for a brief afternoon walk on campus or outside of your home. Sit in a quiet place such as the library, close your eyes, and take several deep breaths. Match your caffeine intake with hydrating water (we won’t tell you to cut back on coffee, not now!) . Keep healthy snacks on hand to make it easy to stay fueled with vitamin rich food. Connecting with your body allows you to be more mindful of your stress level and to actively respond to decrease it.

Shift from distraction to purpose. It’s easy to get caught in a negative feedback loop of feeling bogged down, frustrated, or depressed about all the things you have to do to close out the year or complete your graduate degree. And your feelings are totally valid and real. Yet you are also a whole person and not just the sum of stressful experiences. In those moments, it’s helpful to remind yourself of your purpose for earning that graduate degree. You want to contribute to innovation in your field. You are seeking to impact change in collaboration with your community. You want to better support yourself and your family. You want to make a unique contribution to knowledge and research.

Good enough is good enough. Academia has the capacity to make us feel that we aren’t doing or achieving enough. Yet in reality, we in Core Programs know that this is just not true. We have the privilege of collaborating, and engaging in conversations, with a range of graduate and professional students throughout the year. We get to hear about all the amazing things (no matter how big or small) you are involved in, projects and interests that go above and beyond your degree programs. We also know that you have families you’re taking care of, working at one or two jobs to make ends meet, or that you are not always validated or seen on campus. We too have projects that are not yet done, and a long list of things we want to get to. Your work is never done–this is why the world (and your loved ones) needs you! We’re telling you right now, you are enough. And we see you.

Anchor yourself in community. Make the time in your schedule to hang out with friends, colleagues, or family who care about your well-being and success. Spend time with people whose well-being you care about. Reach out to people who share your hobbies and interests. Go hiking with your best friend. Plan pizza and a movie night with peers in your cohort. Make plans for connecting after your last deadline this quarter. If you’re new to Seattle, consider joining a meetup group based on your interests. Anchoring yourself in community reminds you that you are a whole person!

Warmly,

Jaye Sablan, Kelly Edwards, and Ziyan Bai
Core Programs Team

Getting Unstuck, Moving Forward

“Success is not final, failure is not fatal: it is the courage to continue that counts.”
– Winston Churchill

We know what you’re thinking: why are you already giving me tips on how to move forward from feeling stuck so early in the quarter? Well, we thought we’d offer you some preventative tips to help you pull through, no matter where you’re at this quarter or what year you are in your degree program. Besides, everyone gets stuck in life, and graduate school is no exception by any means. There are several factors that can contribute to feeling stuck from getting our work done. We’ve put together a short list of these, including ways you can move forward. So let’s begin:

Relieving the pressure. Looming deadlines for school and work. Family, community, and financial responsibilities. Preparing for job searches, interviews, and possible relocations—near or far. Those pressures can make us feel overwhelmingly stuck. One way to relieve this weight is to re-focus your attention on what you need right now: Do you need to slow down and take a few deep breaths (repeat every few hours)? After that deep breath or two, and in a calmer state of mind, identify a single step you can take for one of your tasks that would help you feel you have accomplished something today. Each task is just made up of a whole series of steps. We have to start somewhere, and it often helps relieve the pressure to just take that one step.

Finding value in yourself (despite imperfections). We all struggle and have shortcomings. Indeed, in a job interview a common question is, “Tell me about your weaknesses!” Being honest about your own limitations – not critical, just descriptive – can sometimes give you the awareness you need to move ahead again. More often than not, we need a trusted conversation partner to help us see this perspective. Reach out for support from peers, departmental staff or advisors, loved ones, or campus resources (whomever you feel most comfortable with).

Facing the fear of failure. Academia can perpetuate the myth that we must be highly productive, all of the time. And if we’re not, we must be failures. Not only is this unrealistic and unattainable, this kind of culture obscures actual strategies for how to do our best work—and it can keep us from trying in the first place. So how can we best manage this? First, it’s helpful to think of failure in terms of progress over time—so you can grow into being that better professional, practitioner, or scholar. It’s a process, not an end result. You try, you learn, and you move forward—all the while validating and/or rewarding yourself each step of the way. No matter how big or small the milestone. It’s also vital that you build a support system of people who’ve got your back and will recognize your achievements along with you.

Remembering your purpose. Feeling stuck can make you forget why you are in graduate or professional school in the first place. It can also keep you in a false feedback loop that makes you believe that you are unsuccessful or unworthy of achievement. Whenever you feel this way, remember that you are working hard towards your degree for many amazing reasons and focus on those—whether it’s to making a contribution to a field of knowledge, impacting policy that improves lives, getting a job that you love and that helps you provide for your families. Remembering your end goals helps us focus on what really counts.

Warmly,

Jaye Sablan, Kelly Edwards, Ziyan Bai
Core Programs Team

Break?! Making Time For Yourself

We know that depending on your graduate or professional degree program, “spring break” looks very different from your days as an undergraduate–at least in terms of the work. You may be doing fieldwork locally or globally, applying for funding, preparing for job searches or qualifying exams, writing your thesis or dissertation, or working at a practicum site.

All this is true, but this doesn’t mean you can’t appreciate all that is you. In fact, given the tips we share below, you don’t have to wait for an official break to honor–and take care–of yourself. You can make that happen any time of the year.

Press pause. We move at break-neck speeds, going from one task to the next, barely allowing ourselves to just be. So go on, give yourself permission to slow down and breathe deeply, take several deep breaths–for however long it takes. The world will not end, we swear.

Appreciate yourself. Isn’t it funny how it can be easier to treat our friends and loved ones better than we treat ourselves, especially when they’ve been working hard or going through a rough time? So what’s stopping you from treating yourself to a nice meal or new pair of shoes? Why not buy a book you actually want to read? Why can’t you go on a staycation? You know what? There’s absolutely no reason why you can’t, so go on and do it! Do more than one. It’s not selfish. It’s self-love.

Laugh at yourself. You all work incredibly hard in your respective fields, and you are also awesomely, brilliantly human. Both are true. We all can’t help but be imperfect, so we might as well laugh at those embarrassing moments where we aren’t always our best selves.

Let go of guilt. Give yourself permission to not feel awful for taking care of yourself. By taking some time out for you, you’ll be able to return to longer term projects feeling energized. Also, taking time for yourself benefits everyone in your circle, because you’re all the more happier for it!

Warmly,

Jaye Sablan, Kelly Edwards, Ziyan Bai
Core Programs Team

I Am Not Perfect, I Am a Whole Person

Do any of these sound familiar to you?

“My paper has to be perfect, before I submit it to my advisors. They’ll think I’m stupid otherwise.”
“I can’t lose my train of thought during my presentation.”
“I have to run the numbers many more times, before I start my report. If I don’t, my labmates will ridicule me.”
“I need to be on top of everything!“

As you complete your work this quarter, we know that perfectionism can be an obstacle to feeling like you’ve done your best. The culture of academia is good at promoting the notion that your work is always under the toughest scrutiny, leaving little room for error or work that may be rough around the edges.

For some, staying up all night to really nail the analysis can provide a tremendous sense of accomplishment. But repeatedly working at this super-productive pace ultimately comes at a cost to your emotional and physical health. For others, setting goals that are impossible to reach may lead to procrastination, avoidance and feeling not good enough.

For those coping with perfectionism, we see you and encourage you to shift your thinking so you can acknowledge yourself as a whole person. Intellectual and professional development are constant processes that require supportive feedback, self-revision and personal growth over time. Four thoughts below may give you something to try differently as you head into these last few weeks of the quarter:

Accept. Perfectionism reduces you to the sum of what you can and can’t accomplish. The reality is you can’t do it all, and you can’t do it all perfectly. Be concrete and intentional in your goal setting each quarter, so you can do work that is manageable and meaningful to you. Adjust your goals as you go, to know what is really possible to accomplish now, this weekend, or this week.

Invite. Perfectionistic thinking distorts the way you perceive the quality of your work and can contribute to isolation. Instead of feeling like you have to buckle down and work harder, make time to ask peers, faculty advisors, and colleagues for help in clarifying ideas for that seminar paper or presentation. Framing something as a “work-in-progress” can take some pressure off. Knowledge production is a process, not a product. Nobody just “gets there” from sheer self-determination.

Ground. Perfectionism can perpetuate obsessive thinking on school or work related projects. Intentionally spend time with friends, family, and community who know that you are more than just a graduate or professional student. Your community can help remind you that you are a partner, sibling, parent, friend, artist, dancer, gamer, hiker… the list goes on and on.

Enough. Accepting “this is enough” means that you have done the best you could given the time, experience, and resources available, and it is time to be done. It also means you are enough, just as you are.

More resources:

The Battle Between Perfectionism and Productivity, Inside Higher Ed
How to Overcome Perfectionism, AnxietyBC
This’ll Do, Dr. Kelly Edwards, Associate Dean of Student Affairs, UW Graduate School

Living the Truth of Not Yet

Life in graduate school is challenging and stressful, not only because of program demands to excel and be productive, but also because there is life outside of the lab, classroom, and the university. The demands of health, relationships, and responsibilities don’t stop.

We seek to find a balance between our graduate studies, research and life responsibilities—and often feel unsuccessful. This can result in debilitating feelings of failure, perhaps negative thoughts that “something is wrong with me,” which only intensifies shame or guilt.

I find it important to move away from this binary and re-frame it as a work-in-progress. We need to give ourselves permission to live the truth of not yet!

When an infant is learning how to walk and takes her initial steps and falls, we don’t scowl and shout, “Get up, what’s wrong with you?” No, we smile, clap and cheer because we know her muscles are getting stronger and she will find her balance. We don’t expect a seven-year old to be doing calculus. Not yet! But we are good at imposing upon ourselves unrealistic expectations of perfection rather than give ourselves permission to grow, to live not yet.

What helps me is to view the areas of my life not as separate–or compartmentalized–and not to see balancing as an achievement. Rather, it is a process that I listen and pay attention to constantly because it is easy to lose perspective and balance. We must respond by being authentic—being human– and this includes being vulnerable and growing through our struggles and with our limitations.

What helps keep perspective and focus? For some it’s regular exercise—yoga, running, or cycling. For others it’s listening to music, creating art, or talking to a friend. For others it may be meditative or spiritual practices. Whatever helps you—practice it! Practice being present with yourself and others. Stay connected to your passion and to that which grounds and centers you. Rather than being a selfish act, this investment in yourself allows you to be a better student, colleague, partner, friend, and parent.

Live your gifts as a practice. Be gentle with yourself and allow yourself to hold and appreciate the not yet. Then, your work and personal life will be acts which flow from your center, your heart, and will be powerfully generative and transformative.

This post’s guest author is Dr. Gino Aisenberg, Associate Dean for Student Affairs and Diversity in the Graduate School and Associate Professor of Social Work.