The feeling of frustration

[Tall Chai Latte]

Hi all,

In the academic food chain, I am considered to be at the lowest level -- I'm a grad student wanna-be. But since my junior year in college, I started working on research projects, both with a senior grad student or my own independent projects, up till now I've got a pretty good grasp of what grad school might be like. My previous projects have been working out for me (I was very lucky indeed), but lately a train of setbacks just hit me right on. It's been very.... frustrating. Is feeling frustrated normal?

[UnlikelyGrad]

Hi all,

In the academic food chain, I am considered to be at the lowest level -- I'm a grad student wanna-be. But since my junior year in college, I started working on research projects, both with a senior grad student or my own independent projects, up till now I've got a pretty good grasp of what grad school might be like. My previous projects have been working out for me (I was very lucky indeed), but lately a train of setbacks just hit me right on. It's been very.... frustrating. Is feeling frustrated normal?

Sadly, yes. Sometimes research goes well, sometimes it just sucks. The important thing is to learn from those setbacks, to evaluate why things aren't working and what you can change about your methodology (or hypothesis) to get things back on track. Remember, you learn as much from disproving a hypothesis as you do from proving it.

[Genomic Repairman]

Man if your projects aren't working and you are not feeling frustrated then your project is too easy or you aren't working hard enough. Frustrations and being a grad student go hand in hand. It can take for damn ever to get an assay off the ground but once you do it is sweet. Just remember that frustrations cause you to think critically and drive you to become innovative. My best ideas and work have come when my back is to the wall with what to do to solve a problem. The biggest thing is to not let frustration get you down, but also you need to know when to cut your losses. You could take persistence too far and toil endlessly on a project that will go nowhere for too long. I had to cut and run on a project that I spent six months working on full time, it just wasn't going to work.