Lessons I learned from my mother

Hey everyone! I know this blog post is quite the deviation from my usual #scicomm stuff, but my mother said something really insightful to me last night and I really needed to share it.

But first, let me preface it with this - we spend most of our lives believing that our greatest achievements lie in our professional lives - moving up in our careers, successfully balancing

work, life, whatever, getting published... And that's such a trap! There is so much more to life than our professional conquests. This is actually a really toxic mindset, in my opinion, and it can be so hard to be happy when we're basing our self-worth around our professional achievements.

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Ok. Now take a moment to breathe, 'cause that was a lot to take in.

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When I was born, my grandmother said "you can be anything you want to be". Given our work-centrist views in society, I took that to mean I could have any occupation I wanted to work towards. For a long time I wanted to be a medical doctor... and I worked hard for it, but I soon realized that the competitive nature of the field was not something I was interested in further pursuing. So I've spent so much of my time, so much of my grad school experience, trying to be the best so I can get that next job, that next raise, that next... whatever!

But last night, my mom reminded me that I am going to achieve great things. I responded by saying: "sure, but mediocrity is ok too". To which she responded...

"Nah... not just referring to work"

My mind was BLOWN 🤯.

She's so right. I can and WILL achieve great things, and maybe that isn't at work, and that's OK. I plan on travelling the world, meeting lots of amazing people, trying great food and seeing beautiful things.

My life WILL be great, regardless of my work or net worth. And that's enough for me.