Fear and the doctoral program
I have had such a hard time getting any work done. I have always been more than happy to let other aspects of my life take precedence, and to let my work languish on the vine, waiting for the time when I will devote my efforts to it. I think I know why. I am afraid.
Why am I afraid? I am afraid because I don’t want to fail. This seems rather paradoxical; after all, isn’t my failure assured if I don’t do the work?
Of course it is. But my fear of failure has helped me construct, though not completely concsiously, a way out of that conundrum. I am busy; there is no hiding that; it is a fact. Most people don’t carry a full-time job, don’t have a spouse and children, don’t try to participate (more or less) in their church, and try to do doctoral work at the same time. My fear tells me that if I fail, I can use all of these other important commitments as my very legitimate explanation for failure. I simply have too much to do, and so cannot devote the time and energy necessary to my academic work. Consciense clear, problem solved.
This logic is flawed, of course. There are other people who have been in my situation, who are in my situation, or even worse, and they have successfully completed equally difficult tasks. So why can’t I?
Because I don’t want to lose face; I don’t want other people to know that I’m not smart. I don’t want my committee to discover that I’m not intellectually up to the challenge. And so I don’t work, because I don’t want to fail, because I don’t want Peri, or Matt, or Dan, or Maureen, or Prof. Alexander (can’t call him Tom yet; don’t know him well enough) to think that I’m not smart enough. Quite possibly they may think this already because I have taken so long in my program. But all doubt would be dispelled, wouldn’t it, once I failed my comps, or my topic defense?
So, my question becomes: How do I let go of my fear? I’m not sure I have a good answer to that beyond doing the work, doing it the best that I can (working with my committe) and then simply letting the story of my doctorate play itself out. The script is in need of rewrite, since I can’t actually engage the services of another lead actor; I’m pretty much it.
