If worry and being miserable would help out with the Phd experience, then I would say embrace it. But the truth is that its not going to help, and speaking only for myself, my own work is so much better when I am relaxed and happy. So, at the risk of sounding a bit Pollyanna-ish, I DO try to :-s:-s:-s make myself be happy. It can be done. ( even after having a carton of 15 eggs leap from its precarious home at Bleak Towers and rain yolks down my toes, when all I wanted was a cup of coffee....) Its as simple as finding something that makes you smile or laugh. We all have different things that will do this, find the thing that works for you, and do it. Arrrrrrrrr, it can be as simple as talking like a pirate! There, thats got a smile back on my face just like that!

I am not advocating from hiding from reality or being in denial ( or am I?) but the attitude you permit yourself to have can be key. I am cheerfully doing a bit of work on Saturday, having removed egg yolk from my toes, and treating myself to an extra cup of coffee....

http://www.inspirationandmotivation.com/


Act as if you have already achieved your goal and it is yours."
- Dr. Robert Anthony

"Optimism doesn't wait on facts. It deals with prospects. Pessimism is a waste of time."
Norman Cousins

"People are just as happy as they make up their minds to be."
Abraham Lincoln

You will recognize your own path when you come upon it, because you will suddenly have all the energy and imagination you will ever need."
Jerry Gillies
http://www.motivateus.com/rememb.htm

"A likely impossibility is always preferable to an unconvincing possibility." -Aristotle



http://www.motivationalcentral.com/quotes-impossible.html

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uaGHVq4zYLQ&feature=related

and why not feel groovy?8-)

I'm thinking lately that no job (which is how I view my PhD) is worth stressing to the point where you can't sleep, or grind your teeth, or get mad all the time over little things. Trouble is, worry has become a habit! And I worry that if I stop worrying, I'll become lackadasical and won't get anything done. I need a lie down.

Juno, I'm laughing because that is exactly what I do. When I'm not worried, I worry because I'll be too relaxed to get things done. Deary me! :p

Hehe...do you find that if you stop worrying about one thing, you have a few moments of unnerving peace, and then some other worry slides into the vacancy and things are back to normal?

i rely upon this one:

"Failure is simply the opportunity to begin again, this time more intelligently." Henry Ford

Along similar lines to Smoobles:

"'I have missed more than 9,000 shots in my career. I have lost almost 300 games. On 26 occasions I have been entrusted to take the game winning shot... and I missed. I have failed over and over and over again in my life. And that's precisely why I succeed''

Michael Jordan