Blog — Sarah W. Cooley

2022 was my first full year of being an assistant professor. After many years of school, and one brief year as a postdoc, I finally had reached the end of the tunnel and started a tenure track job that, while not perfect, could in many ways be described as my dream job. And it was, overall, not a bad year – I experienced some successes and some failures, spent a lot of time exploring the beautiful state of Oregon, and surprised myself at how much I (mostly) enjoyed teaching and working with students. But, throughout it all, I sensed an overarching emptiness and lack of fulfillment that seemed to permeate my job and life outside of work. And over the past few weeks, I’ve started to probe this feeling and have identified its roots with what I view as a key issue that I think is common across much of academia: the intertwining of our careers with our personal identity and self-worth.

The ’Achievement Bender’

Perhaps not unlike many other academics, I have spent much of my life on an ‘achievement bender’ (a term/concept I learned from the amazing writer Kate Harris). I’ve bounced from one success to another, savoring the high of each achievement and devoting my time and energy to chasing more and more of these successes. This achievement bender dictated not only my life path but also shaped my identity, self-worth and personal happiness. In pursuing my academic goals, I made many personal sacrifices, like living far away from family and friends and regularly having to start over in a new place while knowing no one. It was easy to overlook these sacrifices while chasing another success high, and the excitement and happiness I felt when things were going well in school and/or in my career was genuine.

This reliance on the achievement bender for my personal growth and happiness worked well when I was a student. As a student, you’re constantly chasing a clear end goal (often PhD + then job), and the build-up towards this goal can be very fulfilling, if challenging at times. But upon achieving these goals, it is not uncommon to experience a bit of a letdown or feel somewhat deflated, like thinking – is this really what I have been working towards all this time?

For me, the real challenge came during the shift from the tunnel vision and sprint mindset of the PhD to the much longer-term goal setting of an academic career. Over the past year, it became quite clear to me that this ‘achievement bender’ mindset is simply not sustainable as a career strategy. After receiving a grant rejection last spring, I remember vividly thinking: am I really going to spend the rest of my working life constantly chasing grants, publications and awards and getting upset when I experience rejections but hoping the high of the successes will outweigh the lows? This lifestyle of seeking successes seemingly worked when building towards more short-term achievements, but as a career-long lifestyle, it is simply not for me. I don’t want to spend the rest of my life chasing that next high and getting devastated by the next low.

Academia, Identity and Value

As an assistant professor, trying to separate myself from this achievement bender lifestyle is easier said than done. For one, needing to constantly chase additional grants and publications is fundamentally built into our academic system. But, more importantly, so much of my identity and self-worth has become intertwined with my career and academic achievements. And I’ve noticed more and more how this deep relationship between identity, value and our work is common across academia. For some academics, one’s research is in and of itself tied to one’s own personal identity, whereas for many others, our research and work is built out of our passions and thus has simply become a part of who we are. Academics are now taught to ‘build our own brand’, and most of us have personal websites with information about our research, our background, and sometimes even aspects of our personal lives. Social media often even further encourages blurring of the line between our personal and professional selves.

Now, at face value, there may seem to be nothing wrong with tying one’s identity to one’s work, and if it allows us to find deeper meaning in our careers, then maybe it could even be a positive thing. However, the problem comes when identity, value and self-worth are tied to a career and academic work. After having spent so much time chasing achievements and riding the high of those achievements, my own personal value and identity has become seemingly irrevocably intertwined with my career. I’m left wondering: who am I and who would I be without academia?

This can be deeply unsettling, especially when we (inevitably) experience rejections and/or career setbacks. When I face significant rejection or failure, I now feel unmoored. I sometimes even feel like I’m less of myself, like if my achievements start going away then I wouldn’t be the same person anymore. I imagine I am not alone in these feelings, but I have found that questions of identity, value and academia are not often talked about. Perhaps we are all so caught up in trying to ‘play the game’ to reach our short- and long-term goals that it is easy to ignore our overreliance on our jobs. However, in my view, to have a long, successful career absolutely requires us to be resilient against rejection and to have built a meaningful life and identity outside of the office.

Moving Forward

I wish I could end this reflection with a solution or even a concrete plan moving forward. There is still a lot that I love about my job and chosen career, and I don’t have plans to step away anytime soon. I am grateful to have a job and career that I find meaningful, and I (usually) enjoy going to the office each day and working with many wonderful students and colleagues. But I also know that I desperately need to separate my identity and value from my job and to build a more sustainable approach to pursuing career goals as a professor.

I do want to note that I don’t believe this issue with academia can be solved just by having a better work-life balance. The importance of work-life balance permeates many current conversations surrounding academia, and most successful academics I know take work-life balance seriously. I was counseled many times of the importance of work-life balance and avoiding burnout before starting this job, and I am actually generally pretty happy with my current work-life balance. However, simply limiting the number of hours I work and maintaining hobbies and passions outside of the office is not enough to detangle work, identity and value. While work-life balance is beneficial to personal happiness and certainly part of the solution, it can only go so far if most of my identity and self-worth is related to my work.

So what are my goals for 2023 then? Build greater distance between myself and my work. Remove work email from my phone (already did that – check!). Focus on building stronger relationships, especially outside of academic settings. Set realistic academic goals and timelines and celebrate the minor successes. Work on separating being good at something from its value. Plan trips to visit family and friends. And find joy and meaning in every day, simple things.