Lesson 1: Accepting Your Process

Living in this fast-paced era forces people to always be in a productive mode, producing as quickly as possible. Reach your goals as fast as you can. 

Slowly, we begin, or at least I begin, to believe that if you are not fast enough, you will not survive. Hence, it leads me to forget what it means to take a baby step, to move forward a millimeter, and to enjoy every millisecond I spend on those steps.

Before beginning these four years (or could be shorter—I wish, haha) of this long study by myself, I wonder what kind of journey people mention that most students at this stage will experience. 

Is it the phase of acknowledging you cannot be the know-it-all person?

Or is it the phase of acknowledging your own flaws?

While those two possibilities are indeed part of the process, there is one that I missed. 

While observing and reflecting for one, I found one in the first quarter of my first year, besides those two: accepting my process. 

Choose the word 'accept' here rather than enjoy because just by accepting, we can enjoy, I believe. 

Spending years chasing goals without understanding what milestones mean brings out this side of me that does not accept small steps. In parallel with how fast-paced my surroundings are, I do not like the idea of small progress. I want it to be significant, I want it to be noticeable, I want it to be far. 

But oh well, this study stage would not offer you that—at least from my view.

If it offered you that, it would not take three and a half to four years at a minimum, with no maximum in some cases. No matter how prestigious students at this stage sound in public, they will eventually have to face this phase, I believe. The reality is, as ironic as it is, we have to spend thousands of dollars on this long-term investment, and nothing can accelerate or fully help us during the process (sad truth, but yeah)—we decide the pace ourselves (another sad truth). Not to mention the loneliness (another super sad truth). 

Sometimes I wonder what I'm even doing and why I decided what I decided, lol.

However, after a short meeting last week, I got this small spark of gratitude, I would say?

I began this semi-career path without plenty of experience—I was nothing, and I still am. People are usually in awe of those who decide to pursue this stage, with assumptions such as,

“you must have love to do that a lot.”

“you must be smart.”

“you really love reading, don’t you?”

“you are a great writer, I believe.”

Well, not in my case. I do love writing, but not a skilled one. I love reading, but I don’t think I am a fast reader and fast learner. I wish I were smart, that smart. I wish I could love that activity deeply enough. I even wish I were as resilient to failure as I thought I was—at least, it is still manageable now, and hopefully I can resist until it is finished. 

It took me months to decide on my ‘start’, while it took others only weeks or maybe days. People already spend time on conferences, while I am still figuring out what the actual thing I want to look at. Other students have flown to other cities to observe, while I am still trying to understand where the pantry is in my office, or even how to use the printer (the funfact is I have not tried it until I am writing this text haha). 

In that short moment after the meeting, for the first time I saw something begin to take shape in front of me—just the first stone finally lay on the ground, but I got myself into this is it moment—gaining my confidence back, although only 1%. I revisited my notes, slides, all unused and unpresented diagrams; I recalled every word those experts mentioned; and finally, a piece fell into place! Just one, though, but this is what I meant by understanding milestones. 

The journey was long enough and full of anxiety and uncertainty—not the kind of feeling I would love to encounter, just to find the suitable piece for the starting point. It is still a long, very long way to reach that final goal. 

I am here right now, writing, accompanied by the bright sunshine streaming through the huge window in my bedroom, still wondering what the next steps should be to make sure I am moving forward. I still do not know whether I will receive the support I have been eyeing for—another anxiety and uncertainty, ugh. 

Nonetheless, I have begun to love the small process of finding the puzzle pieces, and I hope people will love that process on their journey, too.