Dumbass or Smartyface?

Lately, it's been a manic alternation between those two extremes- feeling like I am completely benighted, unskilled, ill-equipped, totally sailing in the dark; then feeling sharp, insightful, knowledgeable, capable and competent. This is the weird pendulum of the PhD experience for me, especially throughout the dissertation writing process. Although, more accurately, probably 80% of the experience has been that dumbass impostor feeling. My internal critics have been having a field day as I try to hack my way to the finish line of this weird five year hazing process. 

The above figure is the result of the worst case climate change scenario projected out to 2070, for my study species. The red areas indicate range contraction and the very light green areas indicate range expansion. Under this particular scenario, the species loses 53% of its suitable habitat over the next 50 years. This is similar to the population viability assessment I did (and will have to redo), which shows a species very vulnerable to extinction. Not that surprising, given that it is an island isolate under unique climate and soil conditions, and is basically stranded out there. 

Onward to the molecular phylogeny of the group I am studying, finishing that up. Also doing some fancy historical biogeography  and divergence time estimates for the same group. The analysis shows most likely routes of dispersal and radiation of the species, probably from mainland Mexico across the Gulf of California to Baja, although some taxa may have gone up around and then descended into Baja from the north. I have all of the data and almost al of the analysis, and I'ma good portion of the way into the writing, so it's all moving along.

The main thing is to just keep showing upm, even when the critics in my head are telling me my data is shit, my research is shit, my mind is shit andmy whole dissertation is shit, shit , shit. Keep showing up and putting every effort into all of it in the face of all that self-doubt. It is this repeated encounter that I avoided for 30 years, not going to graduate school. 

Daily meditation, twice daily most days, 20 mins in the morning and 20 at night, has been helping tremendously. A friend of mine in Refuge Recovery gave me a zafu, and it seems so official now. Meditating is sometimes the very last thing I want to do but I have been practicing anyway. At first, ten minutes seems to take forever, but now 20 go by fairly quickly. 

CoDA stepwork is still around step one- We admitted we were powerless over others-- that our lives had become unmanageable. I have been doing a written inventory of all the different ways I have tried to have power over others, how I have tried to manage in all of my relationships. It's a long history and clearly a series of failures rooted in unskillful means and impossible expectations, the core of codependent behavior. It's great to get it all down on paper and see the patterns, but it's slow going and painful. 

The thing that wakes me up at 2 or 3 in the morning currently is not having a job or situation for the fall. Now that I finally emerged out of the species distribution modeling chapter that had me in its clutches for months, maybe I can set aside an hour or two every day to putting all of my job materials together and looking. I'd love to find a post doc doing research somewhere. We'll see. 

Meanwhile it's spring, I'm horny af and have no outlet for it, so it's interesting watching that energy ebb and flow. I'm sick of a lot of the weird cycles of thoughts in my head, but I am trying to apply friendly, compassionate and kind openness and patience to myself. It's not easy for me- I have really been noticing how harsh I am to myself, my own worst enemy by far. Sometimes it seems just as bad as it was years ago. Other times it feels like enormous progress., A similar pendulum to the whole dumbass/smartyface thing. Maybe there's a time in my life at some point with more even keel, stable, peaceful sailing. 

That time is not now.