Sneak Peak Into the Lives of a PhD Scholar: The Truth Bombs Revealed

By Mehwish Majeed

Since childhood, I had this innocent wish to have the title of a doctor with my name. Little did I know that earning this title needs a lot of sacrifices. The first and the foremost sacrifice is giving up your youth. Looking at the Facebook profiles of your age fellows getting married, traveling, and doing stuff normal people do is always the difficult part but then again we, the Ph.D. scholars have our own definition of happiness which others may not understand. So, are you ready to dive deeper into the lives of Ph.D. scholars? Let's get going then.

Finding that Special One

It is believed that your adult life depends on that special person that enters in your life. Well, it is fully true for Ph.D.'s as well, except that for us that special person is our supervisor. When people of our age spend time praying to get their dream partner, we are praying to get a good supervisor. Yes, not only our Ph.D. but our life after this degree highly depends on the supervisor we get for our Ph.D. thesis. A good Ph.D. Supervisor is like a ray of sunlight at the end of the tunnel. He/she is the one who is there to keep you motivated even in the darkest of times. In short, they are the ones who commit to being there with you in health and in sickness for better and for worse. Ph.D. becomes easy once you find that right person who is made for you. Well, I found one.

Seeing that Special Person Happy

We all have that special person we want to see happy. Well, once again for Ph.D.'s that person is his/her supervisor. For us, seeing our supervisor happy is the ultimate goal we strive for. This is because we know that if they are happy with our work then it means we are going in the right direction. A smile on their faces and a few words of appreciation are all we need to keep going.

Facing the Rejections One after the Other

Yes, you have read it right, we feel proud when we receive rejection after completing the review process as going to the review process in a top-tier journal instead of getting desk rejected is itself a great achievement. It's not that we only want to be a part of the review process but the point is that the rejection rate of top-tier journals is so high that you feel happy on just the fact that your paper was at least not desk rejected.

Getting the Support of the People Who Matter to You

Oh no, right now I am not talking about the family or friends. For a Ph.D. scholar, getting the support of the thesis approval committee is what is the most important. We feel lucky when we are able to convince our research board that there is a strong rationale behind conducting the Ph.D. thesis which we have proposed. I will not exaggerate it but this process is more or less like a war of a Ph.D. scholar versus the research board.

Watching Others Struggling

I will be very honest here, most of us have mixed feelings on seeing other Ph.D. scholars being stuck in their research or living a single life or facing rejections from journals. It's not that we are selfish or jealous but seeing others facing the same issues make us feel relaxed that we are not the only people facing problems in Ph.D.

This is our life and these are a few little moments of happiness for us. The truth is only a Ph.D. scholar can understand this. So if you are a Ph.D. scholar then always remember that there comes ease after every hardship. Sometimes, you may feel that it is not worth it, that no one in the world understands the stress you are going throughout this degree but let me assure you, your family and friends may not understand this but they surely want to see you happy. If you have managed to earn this status then you can definitely reach your final destination as well. So be brave and keep working hard.

Mehwish Majeed is a Ph.D. scholar at International Islamic University, Islamabad. She is also working as a lecturer at Capital University of Science and Technology, Islamabad. She likes to share her views on different topics with the community in the form of blog posts and articles.

Article Source:  Sneak Peak Into the Lives of a PhD Scholar: The Truth Bombs Revealed