Writer's Block

So last week I pulled my first all-nighter! It was my first doctoral level paper for my History and Philosophy of Social Welfare class. I think a mix of anxiety and trying to do way too much got the best of me. All the paper asked was for me to give my opinion about the English Poor Laws. MY OPINION! I froze; could not string together a simple few paragraphs of coherent thought.

This feeling brought me back to a couple of places. For one thing, I always go through this same drama in school when it comes to papers. It seems like an instantaneous physical blockage just wells up in my throat when its time to articulate my thoughts, especially if someone will be grading me.

I remember having this feeling for the first time when I was in high school. At twelve years old, I went away to boarding school in Massachusetts with a few thousand other students from around the world. While I had graduated valedictorian from my junior high school, and had been a high honors student my entire early academic career, I struggled to find my voice. I was used to getting good grades through memorizing and regurgitating information, but I had not spent much time really learning how to think critically and come up with my own ideas about things. It was new and challenging to me to learn to flex this muscle, especially amongst classrooms full of other kids who made it look so easy. High school was definitely the start of a struggle with writing; my first English paper at school had me in the same knots I had this past week, only that time I was trying to organize my opinion about the book "The Giver".

I remember vividly having a conversation with my high school physics teacher who kindly informed me that my academic achievements were not due to natural intellect, but to working twice as hard as my peers. While I knew clearly that his comments were an ill-intentioned attempt to discredit the 96 average that I had in his class, I cannot say that this conversation did not further encourage the "I'm not good enough" mantra that I've often played for myself; somewhere along this journey I began to fertilize the thought that my academic success was predicated on grave struggle, not natural gifts. This week I clearly saw how badly I need to transform this thinking.

At around 12am the Wednesday before my Philosophy paper was due, I definitely felt that surge of inadequacy. No matter how hard I tried, I could not produce a document that I thought would qualify as a doctoral level paper. I really felt like I didn't have it in me, and I was embarrassed that what I would hand in at 2pm would leave my professor feeling the same way.

After a shower and a series of short naps, I broke dawn. As the sun crept up I pieced together whatever I had, put a title and reference page on it, and set out the door to face the wrath.

My first class was at 9:30 that morning and I just knew I was going to be late. I made it to the door of the building where my class was being held at 9:34 am, ready for my walk of shame. I opened the creaky door in the old school building, and to my surprise, there was NO ONE in the class; no students or professor. I just knew I screwed up. I was convinced that everyone else had arrived on time and I was missing out on an important field trip. I frantically started making phone calls to see if there was an email or something that I missed, but before long the sound of the door announced the arrival of my professor.

Turned out that this same paper that had me a wreck, contributed to some variation of challenges for the rest of my classmates as well. I ended up being in my first class with the professor alone for at least an hour before my colleagues showed.

Over lunch my classmates and I discussed the challenges we ALL had with the Poor Laws project. I definitely wasn't alone.

While I still handed in a paper that I didn't stand behind 100%, it definitely did not mean that I was a failure or incapable. I had my moment, and I'm sure it won't be the last, but I'm still standing.

For now, I'm just bracing myself for the dreaded return.