I am an archaeologist trying to finish my PhD and at the same time working as a research assistant; which is a paid and permanent position at the university. Permanent as in I will have to advance one I finish the PhD of course but for now I get paid. In return I have to finish the PhD, teach a few classes, cover other professors at times, do some paperwork, deal with these monsters called students etc.

PhD is an interesting step in academia. It's pretty much the most important thing you get to study on; they give you about 6 years to finish it! Then again you have to do it at the age of 20s (normally) when you are quite new actually at whatever it is you are doing and you almost never understand the importance of it until at least when you are about to finish it.

When I turn back and look at all these years I have been studying I noticed I have these blackouts as I call them; for a week, a month or at times longer I just can't stand anything related to the subject. It's like I get burned out, overloaded with all and need a long break.
You are expected to know many things; I am studying Roman architecture, a Roman public building and I am expected to study architecture, pottery, epigraphy, mythology and a bunch of other things. I have a huge building, one of the biggest in antiquity, to study on; it's a 3 story building that measures 170 m X 30 m. Hundreds of building materials found at site; coloumns, bases, architraves and all sorts of entablature fragments along with thousands of small finds including pottery, figurines, coins and bigger ones such as altars and statues. Maddening!
And at least for the first years you think that you have to finish it all, you have to understand all there is to your subject and present a flawless and complete work. I thought that way up until last year and I realised it's never gonna happen; there will always be something missing, something you can never make sense of. There is nothing wrong with that; you are not supposed to hand in a complete work but do whatever you can in the time you have.

As I am nearing this PhD now, about a month or so left, I made my peace with this huge and ugly but lovely and quite familiar now building; I know its every stone now. I have been to the site for a thousand times and just looked at it and wandered it for countless hours. This PhD is not gonna be perfect or complete in any sense but I have been studying on it for years now and you know what, it's gonna be perfect!

Well, I guess that's all, I guess I needed to vent a bit.

And for those patient to read it all I have a few games to giveaway if you'd like; King's Bounty The Legend, King's Bounty: Armored Princess and Faces of War. All of them are Gamersgate copies. Send me a PM with your Gamersgate account.

Still with me? Thank you and g'day!

Well, as far as venting goes, that was one of the nicest ones I've ever red. I would wish you luck with your PhD, but from the looks of it, you pretty much won't have any problems, you seem to love the subject. And so I just wish you general luck, because hey, there's never enough of that. This little block of text of yours have also somehow managed to brighten my evening a bit, so thank you for that.

You are from Turkey, its a very interesting country. Around 450AD the Roman Emporer Constantine adopted christianity as the official religion of the Holy Roman Empire. He also moved the capitol from Rome to Constantinople (modern day Istanbul, Turkey). It marked the beginning of the decline of the Roman Empire. I always find Roman history to be very interesting.

Well despite burning out a few time, you stuck with it. That shows how much you want it, and how much it does mean to you. All I can say it keep at it and make sure you get that PhD. I have had a lot of friends who quit too easily and when they were almost finished. Heck two of my high school friends dropped out near the graduation, one only a couple months till.

So all I can say is kudos to you, and a +1. But I am not in this one, just wanted to say those things. Oh, also, Happy Holidays!

Working for an MD over here, it's tough, frustrating, and sometimes you want to throw your hands in the air and decide that it's all stupid.

Just keep pounding at it, you'll get there eventually. You've been in it this long, you know what's what.

Dammit! I use Gamersgate so rarely I can't even remember the info. I signed up with. Geez.

Don't worry, it's pretty normal to eventually get burned out on anything you spend so much time on. A little breather now and then is good.

good luck with the thesis, hope you the best in life
damn you games are tempting, sadly no gamersgate id for me, nonetheless thanks for the giveaway

All the best. I suspect your PhD will be masterful.

That's the thing about wisdom - we can only strive, knowing that we'll never attain full understanding. It certainly takes great resolve not to give up on a task one knows to be ultimately impossible... Fortunately - the journey in this case is its own reward.

Speaking of which, I should probably work harder on my own damn research -_-'...

I really gotta give you kudos for being able to stick with it. My first major in university was game design specialization in computer science. After a while it became so stressful so I pretty much didn't care about anything except my school work and starting even getting physical pain. Right after that happened I started thinking about the major and how the profs were, and like with you they just expect you to know it. For c++ both profs never showed a line a code and they expected me to code a game in Direct3D and to make multiplayer battleship game that was compatible for ubuntu. I reached the point where I even HATED video games for quite a long time and in fact didn't get back into them until very recently. I then decided to change to mathematics and it's the best decision I've ever made, but at this point I'm incredibly anti-university and am only staying since this is my final year (and really... I know I won't get a job with this).

Great your rant made me rant... but I just wanna say I'm glad you stuck in for something you love to do and finally finished it.

I got really bored with my dissertation material too, at times, so you're not alone. But it feels good when you're finally done with it (even though, as you say, research is never actually "done"). Hang in there! Someone once told me the 'P' in PhD should stand for Patience. Have enough patience, and you'll get there. Put enough grains of sand next to each other, and you really do end up with a beach.