When my friends ask me what’s new with me, I usually answer: “Nothing!” Sometimes I also tell what I wrote the day before, or about the joy with which I realized that my shaky thesis just don’t collapse. Three tears well up in my short-sighted German studies eyes because I realize how boring my life is at the moment. I’m writing my master’s thesis. Then nothing.
Get up, coffee, desk, more coffee, a few headaches from too much screen time and eventually the end of the day. Then a bit of sport, eat whatever you do. The next day it starts all over again. On weekends I leave my brain untouched in its dark cave. Watching the clouds, reports about happy organic farmers or beer, anything that is not academic is allowed.
This reads like the standard day of a standard office worker, but there is one difference: the clock is ticking, the time for the thesis is an exceptional situation. What may happen between registering and handing in the work, getting sick is not an option. A cold, the death of the hamster or a kidnapping by Martians: it doesn’t matter. In addition, the many months of hard work under time pressure are accompanied by self-doubt that one’s own performance is not sufficient and the work is rated poorly.
The “mastermind group” is not a good idea
But the worst thing is: the constant writing. Reading specialist literature and thinking are demanding, but writing is even more so. Because good thought is far from half written. As soon as you want to put down a thought that you thought was crystal clear, the brain suddenly only sends memories of 1001 cat videos or other crap. Then you have to concentrate: what exactly do I want to say? Writing means working your thoughts out of the clutter of your head. And because that’s exhausting, you watch more cat videos to calm you down. Which only makes things worse.
#Column #Uni #live #thesis #religion