(This post is dedicated to my friend, Ros, who appears to be her own worst enemy at the moment.)
I used to be driven by to-do lists. As a result, my mind was constantly ahead of the present moments. Thinking about what I had to do. Without being aware of the accumulating stress, I was in a vicious cycle of setting goals, finishing them and finding the next milestone. Like a horse with a carrot stick hanging in the front to keep it charging ahead.
Because I got the Royal Thai Government Scholarship to study in the US after my high school, I always knew that I'd get a PhD (and not just in any field, my mom picked Chemical Engineering) ever since I was 16. For a girl that young, having your mind set on some very specific goal was quite something. Like training for the Olympics. My eyes were set on that only prize; other things were merely distractions. I worked my butts off to get good grades so I could go to good schools. I thought, if I only got the PhD, I would be really satisfied.
I wouldn't go so far as saying that I wasted 11 years, but I'd say that having a title "Dr." in front of my name wasn't that uplifting. Of course, having the degree allows me to work on something that I might not otherwise be able to, not to mention social status. But what surprised me at the time was that I still wasn't fulfilled. Working on something for a decade and found out that it wasn't quite what you anticipated was like being betrayed. I was rather lost and disappointed.
My next move was that I planned to "have it all" like those women who were interviewed in women's magazines with seemingly shining family, career, style and look. But as I get older, I know that everyone has their own sets of problems; I'm no longer looking up to them and no longer wanting to be like them. I don't want to juggle ten things simultaneously. I just want to be good at some stuff I find meaningful and useful.
The very fact that we can drop dead at any moment is humbling. When I catch myself being too stressed out, I ask myself, would I care about this so much if I'm about to die? If not, then it probably won't matter so much as to get my mind akusala over it.
I used to be driven by to-do lists. As a result, my mind was constantly ahead of the present moments. Thinking about what I had to do. Without being aware of the accumulating stress, I was in a vicious cycle of setting goals, finishing them and finding the next milestone. Like a horse with a carrot stick hanging in the front to keep it charging ahead.
Because I got the Royal Thai Government Scholarship to study in the US after my high school, I always knew that I'd get a PhD (and not just in any field, my mom picked Chemical Engineering) ever since I was 16. For a girl that young, having your mind set on some very specific goal was quite something. Like training for the Olympics. My eyes were set on that only prize; other things were merely distractions. I worked my butts off to get good grades so I could go to good schools. I thought, if I only got the PhD, I would be really satisfied.
I wouldn't go so far as saying that I wasted 11 years, but I'd say that having a title "Dr." in front of my name wasn't that uplifting. Of course, having the degree allows me to work on something that I might not otherwise be able to, not to mention social status. But what surprised me at the time was that I still wasn't fulfilled. Working on something for a decade and found out that it wasn't quite what you anticipated was like being betrayed. I was rather lost and disappointed.
My next move was that I planned to "have it all" like those women who were interviewed in women's magazines with seemingly shining family, career, style and look. But as I get older, I know that everyone has their own sets of problems; I'm no longer looking up to them and no longer wanting to be like them. I don't want to juggle ten things simultaneously. I just want to be good at some stuff I find meaningful and useful.
The very fact that we can drop dead at any moment is humbling. When I catch myself being too stressed out, I ask myself, would I care about this so much if I'm about to die? If not, then it probably won't matter so much as to get my mind akusala over it.
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