Getting a PhD, Week 9: On Passion and Talent
Photo by Jeremy Thomas, via Unsplash
Week 9: On Passion and Talent
I've always found it difficult to look into the future - in high school I couldn't even imagine what I would do after Year 12. After forcing myself to make a decision, I went to uni to study astronomy and creative writing. For the four years of my undergrad degree I had no comprehension of what could come next. Partly to delay the need to come to terms with a post-uni reality, I then applied for a Masters. And now, halfway through that, I was barreling toward yet another moment of reckoning. I could see this branching narrative unfurling ahead of me, with the research year as the prime determinator. The path toward academia seemed the only one illuminated; if I left it, there was only vague, foggy murk to either side. Once I was fully immersed in scientific research, would I finally see the light? Would I find research appealing enough to throw my future into three more years of PhD and the dubious possibility of an academic position at the end of it? Or, after six years of study, of stumbling into the next logical step, was I about to finally learn that there was nothing left for me here?
The first year of my Master of Research - the coursework year, as I refer to it now with a certain faint terror - was a tough one. It was identical in basic structure to my undergraduate years, but the stress and difficulty had been turned up a few notches. At the end of it, as I teetered on the edge of my research year, I felt burned out in ways that I had danced with in undergrad but never quite embraced. But I had done it. The light at the end of the tunnel was approaching: the research year, the year in which I would conduct a substantial research project on a topic that I was interested in; learn something new to add to the banks of human knowledge.
As good as it felt to arrive at that point, there was this uncertainty underlying all of it - I just wasn’t sure that I could do it. At that point I didn't feel capable, knowledgeable or intelligent enough to pursue a career in science. More importantly, I didn’t feel strongly driven. I had been surrounded by classmates who seem much more skilled than I am or much more motivated - some of them both. This was both inspiring and discouraging at times. If I was either naturally talented or highly motivated - preferably both, as it seems the scientists that surround me are - I knew that I could do it, could become a true scientist. For the previous six months or so I hadn't felt either.
Add to this the occasional words of warning from department academics about the high time demands and deep stresses of academia, and it had started to seem easier to just live a normal, unscientific life.
"But we do it because we love it, right?" said one of my astrophysics professors, at the end of such a spiel, given spontaneously shortly before a lesson began - about how her work intruded constantly into her home life, about the mountains of drudge she had to wade through to get to the part that she loved. Reflected in those words were a deep and driving passion for what she was doing, for the science that composed her life’s work thus far. It was the same passion I’d seen light up the eyes of any professor asked about their research topic - the passion that allows them to push aside the difficulties and the frustrations to produce wonders. It was the same passion that I was afraid that I was lacking - and that I was hoping that I might find in my upcoming research.
Here's the thing that I had to remind myself of, in the deepest depths of imposter syndrome: I don't remember a time during which I didn't want to be a scientist, or feel the desire to make a contribution to the swelling sum of human knowledge. I’ve devoured books about bugs or dinosaurs or space since I first learnt to read, and as soon as I learnt that some people studied those things as their job, I wanted in. I wanted to be one of those noble souls brushing the dirt from a T. rex femur or bottling funnel-webs or peering at black holes through a telescope. That desire still lived inside me, but it wasn't as all-consuming as it once was. Having to grapple with the realities of academia and my own abilities had somewhat dimmed the flame. However, although it has wavered at times, I had hope that I could rekindle that fire - if not into a roaring bonfire then at least maybe into something like the one you find on a Bunsen burner. Dipping my toe into a year of astronomy research, it turned out, might just have been the way to do that.
In 2019, when I wrote my Master's thesis, I found, despite my numerous doubts, that I was more or less able to do it. It was tough, and it was stressful, and it was deeply frustrating at times; but despite all of that, I did enjoy research, the satisfaction of solving one incremental problem after another until you’ve somehow found yourself an answer to something. I liked the coding, I liked the writing, I liked the feeling that I was constantly learning something new. I’m still not convinced that I have it in full: this intangible, magical motivation that pushes people to overcome their inner obstacles and achieve great things. But I’ve realised that I might have placed too high an importance on it, or on the all-consuming quality that I used to perceive it as having. Not everyone can have the same passions, and it’s dangerous to compare yourself to others. I’m not Orsola De Marco, the astonishingly passionate and deeply talented astrophysics professor I mentioned earlier; but now, I think that might be okay. I don’t know that I have what it takes to be a real scientist, but I think I’m a step or two closer to believing it.