I forgive you

I had a presentation yesterday. I had invested a lot of time in preparing for it, arranging my slides so that information is passed on in a sequential manner. But as soon as I was in my third slide, people started pouncing on me. My repeated efforts of explaining things and clearing the perspectives  were not listened to. This drifted the entire flow of the presentation, and I got into a defensive mode.

I felt bad. But I got to my feet again and did what I could do my best in convincing atleast some of the audience, who didn't yet have preconceived notions.

Why do people get prejudiced and why do people thing that one word can possibly explain only one meaning? What ever happened to the listening skills? sigh!

....
I forgive

Unlearning

Writing is an indispensable activity during research. I like to write; just that I am lazy. So I try to club sentences and present the idea in a minimum number of words as possible.  But apparently my writing is like whiskey without soda. I am advised to break down the sentence, and write in a diluted, lucid form. While writing I have to be clear about noun, verb, adjective and so. Feels like I am again going through the pages of Wren & Martin, just like a fifth grader. So now I have to write for the mass – which comprise of a handful of people who might read my research. In an earlier post I had mentioned about the sheer non-readability of research report; I feel I am being dragged to follow the same path. Now, that is some serious unlearning I have to do.  So no more hyphens, semicolons, parenthesis and any such add-ons, which in itself have the potential of growing into an independent sentence.

It’s all part of the game.

Or, am I running backwards?

Sometimes the opportunity cost is killing me. It is a cliché:  that people doing their PhD envy their friends about the kind of lavish life they are having. Many a times, I wonder as well – was that a wrong decision? Then I console myself – when I took such a decision, it did not seem wrong, and now that I am into it, let me play along. (Wow! That rhymed, let me rewrite it)

When I took that decision, it did not seem wrong

Now that I am in it, let me play along

PhD by KITA

A research student works in the principle of KITA. KITA is the acronym made famous by the celebrated author on motivation, Herzberg. It simply unfurls as Kick In The Ass.

Oh yeah, that is what we researchers do to get ourselves motivated. Kick in not anyone’s ass, but in ones own and not by anyone else, but by the person alone. That is only how a research can be done. Research can’t be done at gunpoint (data can be collected thus, though). It is to be self motivated and with some amount of eustress. The research supervisor often does not really pay attention to the student because he knows research can’t be done with force. There is a time for it, and it is for sure. Some may have to wait for it and others may have to build it.

There can be days, weeks and months with no progress at all. Nothing to do. And all of a sudden the vault opens and 24 hours seem like few minutes. That is when dejection, disappointment and disengagement makes way for plethora of activities in short notice. Hardly can anything be planned for a research, although veterans strongly recommend having a plan and research diary and stuff. There is virtually no research student who would not have atleast once wondered why has he taken up this task anyway? But the experience and learning is fabulous – not just the subject part, but with regard to the patience required, KITA, reading, writing, reviewing..

I am often asked  - so dong a PhD ah? How long is the course? I say ah well.. this is not a course but research to be done at ones own pace and interest, so it cant be compartmentalized into these many years. Takers are few for this explanation. So now I say 4 years. But what if this gets extended more than 4 years? I’ve an answer : I flunk in few papers and am yet to pass those, hence the delay, I’ld say. I can see those smirks in the faces. 

Time for a  KITA ..

When Diagram?

Balanji asked me "Long time no see". Well yeah, it is indeed long time since I opened my own blog.

Few changes happened. I was in a corporate. I wanted to do a PhD, so to prepare for that I abandoned the big Hairy Corporate World and moved into academics for last 3-4 months and boy! did I enjoy!. It was so very cool. It was a well known Business School in Kerala.

Cutting things short, I am now dong my PhD at the Indian Institute of Science Bangalore.Scholarship yes, but I'm living in austerity. Have a EMI to pay, have lots of things to take care, but then I realize if I miss this opportunity, the opportunity will show its bare-bottom to me and make faces the next time I look for it. I am already feeling old when placed among  my younger classmates. The campus is excellent, the canopy and the little benches to rest. This is one place where I am not made fun of when I go to the library and stay there for the entire day. A typical small talk in the campus is something like this
Person 1 : " Hey you. How you doing?"
Person 2: "Oh Hello.. all fine but still not able to get closer on to that"
Person 1 : "Oh is it? Were you able to get upto the 43rd equation, which says delta t minus e to the power square of xt"?
Person 2: "That was done long back, I am now stuck at the one at page number 822. the one which says the differential equation of sum of all t and gamma divided y epsilon theta..."

You get the picture.

I am now taking a course on Probability and Statistics, and I have so far learned what it feels like to be in a class of Russian, Zulu and Hebrew combined.
I now realize the importance of Venn Diagram. But by the time I make up my mind to understand a stated Venn diagram, the professor says "When Diagram?"

Gosh....