Hi Everyone,

First off – stop reading this right now and read Tony’s post below if you haven’t done so already.

OK – you’re back?

Sara is amazing (which we already knew, of course)!

Now- onto my much-less inspirational post:

I’ve  noticed a trend in several DLEMBites I’ve talked to: various levels of trouble re-integrating into our pre-DLEMBA lives. This seems to most often be on a personal basis, but could presumably be in our professional lives as well. I’ve reflected upon various possible causes for this that include:

• We weren’t paying enough attention to other aspects in our lives, and often the changes that occurred within them, while we were so busy with work and school.
• We were looking for some kind of change in our lives that caused us to pursue this program and we may now be finding that the MBA experience is not the answer or perhaps only part of the answer to what we were looking for.
• It is also possible that we ourselves have changed  through this program and those around us have not. Dealing with that can be difficult.
• Doing the DLEMBA program and continuing our normal lives was, in a way, a very selfish act. We were taking our time (and money) away from others and giving it to Jack DLEMBA.  That require a certain degree of selfishness to do.  Returning to our former generous selves requires a re-adjustment (which Sara, at least, was apparently able to do!).

I’m sure there are other possible causes – and they may be as unique as each of us are.  If you’re feeling any of this, what do you think? Are there lessons we should pass on to the next class?  Are there recovery procedures you’ve discovered that others may benefit from?

[queue anecdotal science guy story]
I tell young astronomers coming to work at an observatory, where they are employed largely for their ability to provide services to other astronomers as opposed to  their own research,  to make sure they make time for their research from day one on the new job. The temptation is to settle into the job first, or finish a project first, and then start research. The result can often be they never pick up research again, or they simply lose time that is hard to make up.  An active research program is vital for most astronomy careers.

Many of us took the time to maintain the other aspects of our lives (analogous to the young astronomers’ research – see, it wasn’t a totally random sidebar) during DLEMBA, and I suspect many did not.  Almost certainly, we all made sacrifices that ended up having real consequences.   We were/are an ambitious group that cares for each other and no one wanted to let their team mates down. Sometimes, not doing so meant letting ourselves or others in our lives down instead.  We may be dealing with the repercussions of those choices now.

Anyhow, I don’t really have a purpose in this post other than to make the point that if you’re in this camp, you’re not alone. It’s not just you.  I believe the strength in each of us that got us through this program will get us through the rest of life’s challenges. I also believe we still remain an incredible support group (“personal board”) for each other, so I recommend reaching out to your fellow DLEMBites and sharing your experiences.

Hopefully this post is too late for everyone and we’ve all gotten through this already, but in case not – we’re all here to help and we’re all (author included) going through the same thing!

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