Leaving Academia

I think it was last week when I listened to Julie Clarenbach's recording of her "Leaving Academia" teleclass, and it really made me think.

While listening to Julie, everything fell into place. One of the reasons she mentioned is that you idealize your previous situation, how much I loved (and still do) working on the bench. But, honestly, did I love working on weekends, working with radioactivity?. Don't I prefer working 4 days a week instead?

But it's not only about idealizing, I just left eleven years of my scientific career, and became an entrepreneur, a life coach. A huge leap (not to mention how difficult it is to change your mindset from employee -should I say trainee?- to business owner). Not only it is a huge change but I was not conscious that a large portion of my identity vanished, and that I needed to come up with a new one. Of course, as I've recently learned, being a scientist does not define myself. It is not my core identity but a role, an important one, but a role. Anyway, I used to think of myself as a scientist, being that the first word that came to mind if you asked me "Who are you?". And now, even though I'll be a scientist at heart my whole life, everything is different. Whenever a see a scientist in a lab coat, a scientist being mentioned I think "That should be me". It really is very hard to let go.

Apart from that, you want and expect everybody's support. But most of your friends and family are going to be resistant, because they also have to let go of that old identity of yours. And because we want their approval, instead of informing them of our decision we try to convince them. And that doesn't feel good, you second guess yourself, you get discouraged and it limits you to move forward.

Not a fun place to be. And what is the solution? Time, of course. And I agree with Julie on that it really helps to acknowledge that you are grieving, and to be gentle to yourself. Connecting with other people experiencing the same always help. Shifting our self doubts into thoughts that make us feel better. I chose to leave academia because that felt right at the moment, and I always do the best I can given the circumstances.

Does it work? Yes, it does. But it's going to take much longer to not feel some pain from time to time.

Thank you Julie for letting me realize of this.

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