got bitched out by mother today–who told me that my father hasn’t gotten a good night’s sleep in days trying to help me edit and find certain material to get this thesis of mine in shape.
got bitched out by my professors, who are not happy with the fact that they had to so much remedial editing work in terms of both grammar and scholarly style–references, bibiographies, etc.
and finally got bitched out by someone else for not being active enough in writing articles for them.
Let’s face it, compliments do not and ought not come for free in this world. Given my druthers i would earn every compliment that i receive based on something that I did, and not because of who I am or because someone, for whatever reason, feels obligated to give me those compliments. On other hand, getting bitched and more importantly, disappointing people blows, and of course, it hurts my own self-image. I feel like a complete loser, and it’s worse than the feelings of being a loser that plagued me incessantly last time–which is about, say, oh, three days ago?
At some point i know i will grow up, at some point i will know how to act responsibly and do things for myself–and not because i will have become so adept or proficient at things, but simply because I am going to be able to work in a non-neurotic fashion–which means knowing what to expect of myself, both in terms of work habits and discipline as well as in the content and quality of that work. I will know not to be perfectionistic, and i will know better than to hope that something boring and tedious is going to miraculously one day turn into something stimulating and meaningful. I know that right now I would like to hear praise from someone, just to better the foul mood that i’m in, and yet i know that it not wishful thinking that will get those compliments but rather doing what i was supposed to be doing in the first place that will get me the compliments that are worth having.
