A couple days ago, as I sat in my first rotation lab, taking a break from my NSF fellowship application, worrying about upcoming tests and paper discussions, I wondered, “Why did I sign-up for all of this?” I could be done with school; I could be at a job making (probably) more money than I am now; I could be an actual adult instead of still a student.<\/p>\n
Then a third year burst in with a protein gel photo and exclaimed, “I got the expression to work!!” I felt so happy from him and excited because I had been at the lab meetings over the last couple months, hearing how much trouble this one assay was giving people in the lab. And now he had it working; this was great news!! I looked back to my computer and saw the above title and realized, “Yes, yes I did.” I was going to write a blog about my concerns over all this schooling and time spent before my “real” life begins but that one moment reminded me why I am here. If I wasn’t meant to be here, I wouldn’t have gotten so excited about someone else’s gel results after all…<\/p>\n
So the moral of the story is that grad school is difficult and choosing to continue to be a student after already being one for 16+ years is a doozy. But if you love what you’re doing and know that the end result is what you want, it’s worth it. You got through 4 years of undgrad right (even those not so fun classes)? And grad school only really has two years of actual classes so it’s technically only really two extra years of student-hood. So this is to encourage you to go for it!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
A couple days ago, as I sat in my first rotation lab, taking a break from my NSF fellowship application, worrying about upcoming tests and paper discussions, I wondered, “Why did I sign-up for all of this?” I could be … Continue reading