Sprinting

You may be wondering why all of these blog posts are coming out now. Well, I'll tell you. I'm bored. I've been so insanely busy the last two or three weeks that now, when I'm at a normal level of activity, it feels like I'm a lazy slob. I also have the constant nagging thought that there is something I'm forgetting to do. That, plus the fact that I have been proctoring exams like crazy (sitting in a quiet room with out a lot of things to do), means blogging. I'm not going to reach my 52 posts a year goal, but that's ok.

Back to what I was saying earlier about being bored…I hate that. I had been staying up till well past midnight; now I can't fall asleep till 1 am, or sleep past 7 am. I was constantly on the go, and now I can't sit still. It always takes me a few weeks to get back to normal and unwind. And by that time, school is starting to get going again. My problem, I think, is that I want it NOW. I want to be good at everything now, I want to be done with tasks as soon as I get them, and I want to have everything figured out. Sadly for me and my over-developed sense of perfectionism, that is not ow the world and especially the academic world works.

Things take time. Thinking takes time. Figuring stuff out is a life-long process. The idea that I can keep learning new things and keep getting better really appeals to me. I love the fact that my JOB is to learn new things. But there is also that part of me that likes knowing the answers. It's an odd juxtaposition of traits to have, and a weird space to inhabit sometimes, this gap between wanting to know everything and enjoying the process of learning.

I guess the take home message of all this rambling is that this - grad school, life, the quest to become a better person, whatever 'this' is for you - is a marathon, not a sprint. If we spend our time rushing to 'finish', we will burn out like a flash in a pan. We have to keep moving, certainly, but at a pace that is sustainable. That pace changes depending on life circumstances and individual characteristics. But finding equilibrium is so important. And it's something that I need to get better at.

That said, there are times when life requires you to sprint, and that's ok too. It takes a specific set of skills to do it well: focus, grit, agility and adaptability, and precision. It's easy when you are really busy for short periods of time to forget things and let details slip (as I and my students know…poor kids). The least little hiccough or bump in the road can derail your whole plan (how is that for mixing metaphors: bodily functions, roads and trains…win). The trick is to not let that be your whole life. Deal with those times when they come but let them go when they are over. Again…still working on this myself.

So, does anyone have any tips/tricks/suggestions about how you shift gears from sprinting to marathon style jogging? I could sure use some...