Capable.

So this year, I'm on my own.  Where school is concerned, that is.  I'm out of funding until I pass my exams (which I should have passed ages ago).  So I'm paying my own way this year.  Which means I'm dependent on financial aid.  Can't pay tuition without a loan.  And yesterday--yesterday I got this horrible message form the financial aid office telling me I wasn't eligible for financial aid due to insufficient academic progress.  Mind you, this is one day after I put nearly $4,000 in tuition on my credit card, depending on my loan to come through to pay it off.

So I panicked.  For about 45 minutes.  Just sat on my bed with thoughts of failure and not being able to finish my program whirling through my head.  It was miserable.

And then I snapped myself out of it and got to work.  Prepped a brief lesson for my classes.  Got to school to teach.  Let my students out a bit early each hour so I could make phone calls while campus offices were open.  I made an appointment with the ombudsman to begin the appeals process.  I emailed a faculty mentor to get her advice.  I emailed the chair of graduate studies to alert him to the situation and ask if we could meet to discuss it.  I called the office that helped me procure a leave of absence last year to see if they could help advocate for me.  I did everything I could think of to set an appeal in motion and get my ducks in a row.

Everything except talk to the financial aid office, that is.  Because they never answered their phone, there was no voicemail option (even though their phone said there was), and no email option (even though their website said there was).  It was very frustrating.

So first thing this morning I went to campus to visit the financial aid office.  Where I discovered there had been a clerical error.  Their computer had not registered that I was on academic leave last year and so had disqualified me.  Three minutes and it was fixed.  I should get my financial aid award tomorrow.

And I am proud of myself.  A year ago I would have had a massive panic attack had this happened.  And then just given up.  Six months ago, I would have melted into a puddle of tears.  But yesterday I did what needed to be done.  Calmly and rationally assessing the situation and finding alternatives.  Nary a tear.  It felt lovely.  It's so good, after years of depression, to feel like myself.  To be capable and productive.

So here I go.  Back into the breach, prepping for exams which I will take in may or june.  And next year I will write two chapters of my dissertation, with a third during the summer, so that fall of 2011 I can go on the job market.  And June of 2012 will see me robed to receive my third degree.  Just watch and see.

Another long day in the library. I've been on campus since 7:30 this morning and have been hard at work ever since, with a quick lunch break around 2:30. And I'll stick to it for at least another 45 minutes. Nothing like a long day on a hard chair (curse the library reading room which poses the choice between a chair with a cushioned seat but which screws my back up or a chair with no cushioning but which supports my back).

I haven't done much work towards my exams today. What I have done is explore and begin using a couple of new time management devices. And I'm really excited about them. One of my biggest challenges has always been keeping myself on task. I tend to think about my projects as wholes, rather than as processes with many discrete steps that can be taken individually. The result of that kind of thinking is that I'm daunted by the sheer size of my projects and I have a really hard time moving. So I'm excited about new tools that will help with time management and efficiency.

• A few months ago, J(wh) suggested I read David Allen's Getting Things Done: The Art of Stress-Free Productivity. I started it and actually made it through about 2/3 of the book. But it was sacrificed to my proclivity to thinking whole. It seemed like the only way to implement the book's plan was to do everything right away and I couldn't see my way to doing that. So when J(wh) shared the Thinking Rock software based on Allen's book, I took a look. Today I downloaded it and have been entering projects and tasks. And I'm really impressed. It let's you not only create a list of tasks, it prompts you to define where a task must be accomplished, link tasks in projects, brainstorm what needs to be done, etc. I think it will be really useful.
• When I commented to J(wh) (yes, he is my source of most tech tips) that I wished Google calendar had a task list, he told me about Remember the Milk, an online task manager that offers an interface with Google calendar. I'd prefer to simply use Thinking Rock, as it has greater capacity for organizing projects and tasks, but it's not web-based (not yet, anyway). And I want to be able to access my daily task lists online in case I don't have my laptop with me. So I'll spend a few minutes transferring tasks to my Google calendar when I do a daily review each morning.
• And finally a research tool: Zotero. I found this a few weeks ago (actually even longer ago than that, but it resurfaced a few weeks ago when I actually checked it out). And I have to say that this is an amazing research tool. Incredibly easy to use. Wonderful capacity as a tool. If you're looking for a way to manage your research, I think this is about the best option I've seen.

So now that I've taken steps to make myself more efficient, hopefully I'll make better strides in terms of productivity.

Anxiety

So. I suppose this blog won’t help me much if I don’t use it. Funny how that works.

Yesterday was not good. Well, at least not in the moment. On Monday I finally sent a couple of those emails I was supposed to send a week ago. But I’m not going to dwell on when I was supposed to send them, as that usually gets me down on myself. So I sent them on Monday. And one of the professors actually responded the same day, offering to meet with me on Tuesday morning. For a variety of reasons I was hesitant to talk to him—I’ve never had a class from him; he’s always struck me as a bit distant; one of my other committee members seemed to have reservations about him; and of course all of my usual self-doubt which leaves me feeling incompetent. So I procrastinated all morning, lazing around in bed surfing the web rather than reviewing my lists and prepping for the meeting.

By the time I left home, I was feeling panicky. Anxious over the quality of the project and how it would be received by someone who didn’t know me and already like me. I was actually in tears before I left, thinking the worst of myself and my abilities, sure that what I can do just isn’t good enough. I knew I couldn’t walk into a professor’s office in tears. Fortunately I also know that J(wh) can usually talk me through my anxiety. So I called him and we talked as I drove. He made me articulate what I hoped to achieve with this meeting. I talked through the theoretical points of my project and avenues I’m trying to explore to enhance those theoretical interests. And I took the time to get control of my breathing. By the time I got to the professor’s office I was much calmer.

Which is a very good thing. Because after I summed up my project and explained what I needed help with, the professor’s first order of business was to understand my background in the program. And when he heard I was approaching the end of my fourth year enrolled, his immediate response was to tell me I would run out of teaching support if I didn’t pass my exams by the end of my 12th quarter. Which surprised me. And threw me into a new panic because funding is one of my perpetual sources of anxiety and stress. If J(wh) hadn’t helped me talk through my previous anxiety, I think I would have broken down into tears on the spot. Fortunately I kept it together, though not well enough to realize I’ve only had ten quarters of teaching support so I’m actually still on track for the schedule I’d set for myself (completing exams before the end of Winter 2009).

The meeting ended up being primarily useful in terms of very practical advice about timing and committee formation and meetings, etc. And a promise to review my lists and make suggestions. After I calmed myself down a bit, I realized that I still had enough time to get my exams done while funded. And I called J(wh) and he talked me through my second bout of anxiety for the morning. All of which made me realize how very important it is that instead of fearing what I don’t know and so avoiding knowing it, I need to just find out what the reality is. Even if the reality is bad, at least I’ll know it rather than fearing the unknown. And I can only solve known problems. I know that sounds simple—like something I should just understand. But sometimes the simple things are the hardest to deal with.