One of my favorite parts about graduate school is the way in which I am challenged beyond what I thought previously possible. It's a constant exercise in feeling and apathy - I care so deeply about what I'm doing and put so much of myself into it, and, yet, when I receive feedback and realize that what I thought to be great was not so great, it's so easy to simply give up. A certain amount of apathy is required in graduate school - if I allowed my self-worth to be tied up in straight As I might as well quit and resign myself to a life of flipping burgers. I am learning like never before to embrace the process of being trained to be a better historian, and I firmly believe a large part of that process is the B+...the constant reminder that I'm never quite there.
In college I learned to believe in myself - in graduate school I learn to believe in the process, but never my ability to achieve any sort of perfection. It's an exercise in feeling, apathy, and - perhaps even more important - humility. I must never allow myself to think I have arrived, because arrive I never will. Here I am called to care deeply, to accept failure, but not allow that constant failure to inhibit my desire for perfection.
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