What do you do to relax while waiting?

[halfpint]

Skiing has been a cure-all. Other than that, going to free music weekends at the Brooklyn Academy of Music, biking in Prospect Park, basically doing all the things in New York City that I didn't have time to do during undergrad. Planning overseas trips for the summer.

Good luck to all who are still waiting.

[miratrix]

My mother came and visited me this weekend! It was awesome, she's never seen my apartment or met any of my friends here, and of course we went out to eat and bought ridiculous amounts of food from the [our ethnicity] grocery store. Also, she's very supportive and reassuring and full of "we're so proud of you" talk, it makes waiting easier

[belevitt]

Realistically- I smoke a lot more cigarettes. Peruse grad school forum boards. Research faculty. Make halfassed attempts at maintaining friendships by hanging out with people at bars. I guess I don't really have a good strategy for dealing with stress and in hindsight, this would have been the perfect opportunity to work out and get healthy before the rush of grad school begins.

[EireDuck]

I spend my time wondering if this random quiz has the secret for what school I should choose:

http://bluepyramid.org/ia/uquiz.htm

[psycholinguist]

Last time I did this, I got my undergraduate university. This time, I got UCSD. Go figure.

Then again, I don't know if all of the schools I applied to are included.

[Yellow#5]

I got a wave of rejections Friday, expected, but demoralizing none the less.

From time to time, I volunteer with Citizen Schools, which is a Boston area organization that helps high school kids "at risk" of not graduating, learn the necessary skills to, not only graduate, but apply, get accepted and thrive in college.

I gave them a small donation and it made me feel better. I know that not everyone can afford to give even a little to these kinds of programs, but volunteering is a great thing to do to take our minds off our problems and re-affirm our own commitments to education.

Way back in January on MLK day, I spent the day at the Citizen Schools and did a workshops with some High School Juniors. We talked about the power of the federal government to effect change vs. the individual's capacity to do so throughout our several activities. When my kid pulled a card with historical facts about Rosa Parks we talked about this theme a little bit and one of my kids was making the point that Rosa Parks changed the law about blacks having equal rights in the south before the federal government did. Of course, she was incorrect about that, because the 13th, 14th and 15th Amendments were passed after the Civil War and technically, blacks in the South did have equal rights guaranteed to them by the Constitution, and I pointed out to her that it took almost one hundred years for those rights to be made real, through the actions of people like Rosa Parks. I was very gentle about how I brought this up and I wrote down the dates and asked her to do the subtraction, then let her draw her own conclusion about that discrepency.

Well, she was a bit stunned, and even left the room for 15 minutes or so, because I think she was pretty upset to learn this. She was a black girl, and this MLK day was, of course, just after Barack Obama's inauguration, so I'm sure she was feeling very optimistic about the world, that it was a fair place where racism might exist, but certainly doesn't prevent a black man from being president. Though, I was sad to be the one to ruin her day, I was also struck by how little high school kids really think about history and how little opportunity many people get in their lives to really ponder the world they live in, because it is such a huge luxury for some. Probably she had heard all these "facts" before, but never really thought about the significance of the 14th Amendment's date of ratification and Rosa Parks refusing to move to the back of the bus and the date that occured.

Maybe I should be typing this sentiment under the discussion of the NYT article that discusses how the humanities need to "justify" their value. Mainly, I want to point out that all of us who are trying to get into grad school right now, who are measuring ourselves against other "hypothetical" applicants and nit-picking through our personal statement which we now find totally embarrassing (me included), we all have been lucky enough to get a college education already. I just wanted to write this little thought about my experience the innocuous facts that we all have swimming around in our brains are pretty earth-shattering to other people, who haven't had the luxury of college yet.

So, just to relax, if you're feeling like you're not worth anything based on a huge stack of rejections, you might look for a volunteer opportunity like this where you are, because it's great to share the wealth of our educations instead of just feeling bad.

[MDLee]

So, just to relax, if you're feeling like you're not worth anything based on a huge stack of rejections, you might look for a volunteer opportunity like this where you are, because it's great to share the wealth of our educations instead of just feeling bad.

::round of applause for Yellow#5:::

Completely agree here. I find that I worry less about what I'm not getting (a PhD...apparently) when I work with kids, who really don't care what you have anyway. "You went to college!" they stare at me wide-eyed...

Oh yes, hun. Went to college. And all I got was a bumper sticker.

Then they look at the bumper sticker and get all giddy. Suddenly we start talking about how cool it is to be able to have THAT bumper sticker. Which...of course...is red. And fits so nicely on the window. And calls me that really great word "alumni" which the kids repeat twenty times because it sounds so different. They act like the dictionary definition for alumni is "goddess of everything knowledgeable"

Suddenly I don't mind my life anymore. Funny how kids can remind you your glass is actually half-full.

Much thanks for helping me end my own pity-party Yellow#5 :wink:

[GirlattheHelm]

I've been chain smoking lately.

... I'll take anything I can get at this point, really.

[MDLee]

I've been chain smoking lately.

... I'll take anything I can get at this point, really.

Sigh. I'd start with the discussion of health issues, but I've been living on caffeinated beverages and Little Debbie Snack Cakes, so I think I'm more guilty of self abuse than you are right now.

Deep breath GirlattheHelm. We're gonna make it.

[psychdork]

If I'm a work, then check my email & the forums/results page here compulsively.

Classes don't help me relax, but they do distract me.

Otherwise, I've been working out/dancing/yoga a lot. Helps me relax & I've been losing weight/getting into shape which makes me feel a lot better!

[illinoisellie]

So I went out for Chinese a couple months ago - I think end of January. Right before I got back some of my rejections.

I ended up taping the message from the fortune cookie to the top of my desk.

I look at it whenever I'm feeling particularly dejected.

"Your present plans are going to succeed."

The only question is, which of my present plans, A, B, or C, is the damn cookie talking about???

[whateverneveram3n]

The only question is, which of my present plans, A, B, or C, is the damn cookie talking about???

I hope you showed that cookie who was boss. Stupid vague cookie.

I've actually been managing to stay somewhat calm up until the last week or so...now that I'm sitting on three rejections and three probably-who-the-hell-knows rejections, I'm starting to freak out a little bit. I think it's more the not knowing that's really getting to me...I just want to know how my apps are going to turn out already. Even if it's all rejections...ok I guess, I'm working on a plan b. I just want to get on with my life already.

I've found myself starting to stress eat--so I'm not keeping ANYthing bad to eat in the house...and instead I end up eating a LOT of oranges and pistachios. Last night I even had my first apps-related dream...I got a call from one of my remaining schools (my first choice out of all of them, in waking life), for an interview. The guy on the phone asked me some random questions, about life and what I like to do with my free time. It was a pleasant call. And then a little after that the dream ended, or at least my memory of it. And when I woke up, it was the first thing on my mind. :|

On the other hand, I'm making myself get back into running regularly (the warming weather is certainly helping with that effort)...so that's at least helping to offset the stress-eating, and usually helps to offset some stress, too. @GirlattheHelm, I used to be an on-off again smoker myself, and this process is very nearly convincing me to buy a pack, too. Hopefully I will get some good news this week and my willpower will hold out until then... (It also helps that the kind I used to smoke are ridiculously hard to find out here in the midwest...)

[inactive_since_inf]

...attend campus recruitment

[nandelle]

I've recently been practicing more...i play harp and have a stack of pieces I've been trying to learn but not actually working on...so i've decided that this week instead of obsessively checking my e-mail i'm going to learn at least the 1st part of the Dussek Sonata

So far it's 1 pg at half tempo...

[MDLee]

...attend campus recruitment

Showoff

[boneh3ad]

I broke out my old Super Nintendo, and between classes and working, I have been playing a lot of Donkey Kong Country.

[psycholinguist]

I broke out my old Super Nintendo, and between classes and working, I have been playing a lot of Donkey Kong Country.

Still a great game!

[psychdork]

Still a great game!

I wish mine still worked! I loved my SNES!

[psycholinguist]

I wish mine still worked! I loved my SNES!

You might be able to find a semi-decent emulator for PC or Mac. Not that I know whether such things are legal.

[boneh3ad]

I wish mine still worked! I loved my SNES!

Yeah, a lot of those games are a lot easier when I play them now than they were when I was 10. Go figure...

Sim City still rocks me though... geez was that hard.

[psycholinguist]

Sim City still rocks me though... geez was that hard.

I bought a copy of SimCity 4 a couple of summers back, and I'm still playing SimCity 2000!

Not to mention that I never got tired of Civilization II...

[boneh3ad]

I was disappointed with Sim City 4. For me, it added so much micromanaging that it took away from the whole "build a city" experience. If I wanted to manage things that closely, I would run for mayor of a real city.

[ec86]

Both my lower eyelids have started twitching uncontrollably today. I don't think it's from lack of sleep as I was pretty "regular" for the past few days. It's really bothering me. Any remedies?

[psycholinguist]

I hear that stress and anxiety can be triggers as well. Fortunately, as I understand it, most eye-twitches go away over time. And anything you can do to try and relax is probably going to help with the eye-twitches as well.

NOTE: I am anything but a doctor. Just a disclaimer. But: when that used to happen to me back in middle-school, I'd simply (wash my hands, then) get into a relaxing position, close the eye(s) in question, and then apply firm pressure to the site of the twitch for a while. It came back a few times after doing this, but after one time when I lay down and pressed the problem-spot for about 25 minutes, it never bothered me again.

[inactive_since_inf]

Showoff

Comeon MDLee, I apologise for looking elsewhere when you had already offered me a contract for trucking business. Can I get my offer letter then? :wink: When can I start....