This weekend, I met one of my best friends to see a Greek tragedy called Medea in the theater. Where I live, high school pupils are obliged to experience culture. After the show with great performances and of course a tragic ending, we went to the wardrobe where one high school pupil asked his friend to join him in the MacDonald’s. So much for ‘higher’ culture!
Afterwards, we went to a bar and we talked about life as usual. My friend has been working on his master thesis for 3 years and for a couple of months now he has this great girlfriend. She is a warm empathic person and really connects with my friend. As you can imagine, working on your master thesis for 3 years without any significant results creates a very negative attitude towards your thesis. Other than disappointing supervisors and possibly your family, you’re mostly disappointed in yourself. This creates an enormous tension. For the last two years, every once in a while I have tried to help him with his thesis, but somehow he was totally stuck. Nothing helped. He did not want to give up since he was so close and he would have to pay back a lot of lent money. His new girlfriend was not so much interested in his rationale about the situation, but how he felt about it. And he felt like shit. At a certain point, she asked him why he simply didn’t give up. That thought never really crossed his mind, but once he allowed himself to really consider it, a calm relaxed feeling entered his mind. This feeling released all the tension built up over the years and a huge load fell off his shoulders. Last week, my friend decided to not finish his master thesis.
I really admire his choice, even though I still think he could have finished. Sometimes there are these choices you’d rather not make, and his choice was one of those. To make such a choice requires guts and is never easy. But when you do, you can finally go on with your life.
Today, I have been trying to apply this ‘tension-theory’ on myself, which by the way was inspired by the awesome tv series Dexter. My research question of today: where do I have tension, and how can I release it? One area immediately came to mind: relationships. Somehow, I have this idea that I should be in a good relationship and that has been creating tension since it is not working out. Solution: drop the idea. Fuck relationships. The next area was also easy since I woke up worrying about the whole mess with my supervisors. Here however, the solution is not clear. The release of tension I envision is getting angry with my supervisors and telling them to clear up their mess. However, I’m afraid this only creates more tension afterwards. So, how can I release the tension in a positive way? Someday in the future, I will find a way…
Filed under: Life, Work | Tagged: friends, frustration, stress, supervisors, workplace politics |
The PhD Diaries 
I would like to refer to a point I made in a comment to AbstractGirl’s “on being annoyed”. I mention there that it’s just a ride.
Point being: have you ever seen someone in your workplace suddenly disappear? Stress, death, sickness, maternity leave, etc.? I am always amazed by how quickly that person is replaced and eventually forgotten. Sure, this person was important at the time, but right now papers need to be written, and an absent guy can’t write as well as a present guy.
Point being: you are replaceable. So chill. Sit back. Eat candy. Love fun. Celebrate. Oh, and bring cookies to work and don’t forget to invite me.
So if I understand it right, the tension theory is as follows: if something causes tension, just drop it? But how are you ever going to stick with anything at all then? I’m pretty sure that everything causes tension at some point…
Good point. Let me clarify.
I say that you have some idea of what you like the world would be, and an understanding of how the world is. When these conflict, tension arises. Then there are two obvious approach to resolve the tension: change the idea or change the world.
I think people focus on how they can change the world and not on whether they should change the idea. In my friend’s case, he had tried to change the world for 3 years, but it didn’t work. As a result, the conflict between idea and world became enormous. Maybe it’s some kind of buddhist approach to life, but when you drop all your ideas and expectations, then you enter nirwana… right?
Thanks for the clarification, Mr. Thesis! Now I see your point and I actually agree with it. Funny thing is that I have a similar rule for myself: either do something to change the situation, or stop bitchin’ about it. But yours is better because the “stop bitchin'” can still cause tension. Actually, come to think of it, I think my rule might actually cause even more tension, if you’re stil bothered by something but don’t allow yourself to bitch about it 🙂
So yeah, your rule is better because the alternative to doing something to change the situation is letting go of the idea, not only for the outside world but also from within. Much more zen, and should probably work a lot better for releasing tension!
Ugh.
Bless you Donna! 🙂
Yep, with some clever reasoning, you can justify almost anything!