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Nov 11, 2009, 02:45 AM
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Member Since: Jul 2008
Posts: 795
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Deli, take it from a perfectionist when it comes to matters intellectual: Perfection is a myth. A perfect score on an exam only means you knew everything that was asked to the extent needed for that ONE exam. What about all the other stuff in the subject area? Do you think people with perfect exam scores are really "perfect" in knowing the whole subject?
There is no such thing as "the best" in anything. There are flavors; the world is not wholly objective intellectually. There are no UNIVERSAL tests to determine who's best out in the “real world.” In a uni, sure someone can score higher but that says little about how the outside world operates.
Who was the greater scientist/genius--Newton or Einstein?
Who's the best philosopher--Plato, Aristotle, Kant, Hegel, Locke, Descartes..? Each has their adherents. Are any of them perfect?
Who's the best novelist Steinbeck or Hemingway or Faulkner or John Grisham?
Who's the best composer? Mozart, Beethoven...
Who's the best songwriting duo: Rodgers and Hammerstein, Lieber and Stoller, Lennon and McCartney, Jagger and Richards?
Who's the best poet? The best painter? The best Impressionist even?
Not getting 100 on a uni exam doesn’t mean you're the bad, flawed person that you sometimes think you are and that you fear others think, too.
I used to go into teaching assistant's or professor’s offices and ask them to explain why I got an A on papers or exams! Not to grub for extra points but out of perfectionism to know how I could have done even better--many times I'd have gotten the highest score in the class. How's that for perfectionism?
Here's advice I was given about getting through a PhD program that I think you should apply, conceptually, to your own circumstances.
1. They require so much reading each week (1000-2000 pages per class means about 3000 to 8000 pages/week in total) that you can't read it all, so you have to be able to pick and choose what to focus on and where--if--to skim. Giving up the idea that you can be the most expert on every idea and word. You might miss some stuff at the time, but you can pick it up later.
2. Don't waste your time focusing on grades, i.e. do just enough to pass. About the only thing that matters as far as getting a big-time academic job is the quality of your dissertation. Write a great diss, and no one cares if you got low grades when it comes to deciding to hire you or not.
3. Just barely pass your field exams (those monster exams that cover everything in a field). No one cares enough when it comes to hiring--the diss. dwarfs all else.
Motto: Abandon the need to be the best, to be perfect, to excel at everything. Don't waste time on stuff that isn't really important. Just get by on a lot of it and kick-a on what does really matter. And your two exams only matter that you just barely pass.
What you need to do: Focus on what matters--finishing and getting to your honours work. Get your 50 and be done with it. The day after you get out of that current degree, you won't care whether you got 50 or 100. How concerned were you with your high school grades once you got to college? Hopefully NOT AT ALL.
Bare down, get it done, bite the bullet of not getting an exceptional score. You probably will do very well no matter how much time you put into it, knowing you. Don’t skip the exam. Don’t you deep down know that you get your 50 or whatever just by walking in without ANY additional work? Did you really get to the end of a course without learning anything that you need to learn it all in one big rush at the end?
Take the test.
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out of my mind, left behind
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