My weaker tendencies are winning.
I have spent a lot of time playing games on my phone the past few days. They’re high quality, artful games; as far as entertainment goes they’re of the enriching variety. But they’re still just entertainment, and they have been spreading outside of what i consider to be an enriching amount of entertainment.
Even discounting games, though, I have been pissing away my time in a manner that is neither satisfying nor healthy. Hours have disappeared and I’m left feeling mildly burnt out with nothing to show for it.
At least the games give me a false sense of accomplishment, right? Which is why I’ve been playing them, I guess.
I started a master’s degree not least because it seemed easier than continuing to try to start up a business. It was structured, I would be led through it, I’d have a comfortable enough amount to live on each month, and it would provide me with an accolade at the end, qualifying me to do a new category of work. I am academically gifted, so academia is a safe place for me. It’s like riding with stabilisers.
Well the stabilisers have fucking fallen off now, haven’t they?
I’m not sure I have any wheels left at all. I think I’m scared to look. But I’ve definitely stopped riding.
I’ve spent a lot of time over the past week or so questioning whether I really want to be doing my master’s anymore. And I can’t tell if I’m realising that my heart isn’t in it and I should be doing something else with my precious time…or if I’m just a lazy fuck who defaults to self-sabotage when left to her own devices.
Until very recently, I wanted the prestige of progressing to a PhD. It felt important to my identity to become ‘highly educated’. But I’ve come to realise it would just be another shield to hide behind. It wouldn’t solve the problem of needing to be braver.
But, without the lure of a certain kind of status, what’s really in it for me? I love psychology, don’t get me wrong, I will never cease my relentless pursuit of understanding. But here, alone in my room, do I care at all about writing a clinical research proposal? It seems not.
Here, alone in my room, the most worthy pursuit that interests me is writing this blog.
It would be ridiculous to give up on the work and thousands of pounds I’ve sunk into this endeavour. And being qualified to work in psychology will surely be useful to me. But there are some parts of myself I need to reconcile, and a solution I need to uncover, if I want to move forward.
Because, otherwise, my weaker tendencies will win.