rebeccmeister

My postdoc mentor here has lab members create a "Semester Plan" each semester. I've participated sporadically, but I mention them here because of one facet of the plan-creation process.

There's a faculty development podcast that walks through the process for creating a Semester Plan, which involves documenting your personal and professional goals, and then actually mapping them to the space-time continuum. At the end, the person who put the podcast together says, "Now take a minute to assess how you feel about your plan - nervous, worried, excited." That's the facet of interest at the moment.

So here's where I am, today. In the thick of things as far as job applications go. But I just submitted one where, instead of feeling frustrated/sad/dejected/gloomy, I feel pretty darned EXCITED. As in, YES, there are jobs out there that I'm highly qualified for, that sound awesome, and maybe, just maybe, I have a shot at them. I'm also relieved to check this off the to-do list for today, because yes, it's a long, exhausting to-do list. But now I don't have anything pressing that is going to require a lot of complex thought.

I need to remember this feeling of excitement, and use it to sustain myself through this whole job application season. I'll bet you a billion other top-notch people have applied for this particular job, anyway.

And I also need to just delete things from the memory banks, so that I don't get too bogged down in waiting to hear back.