Rather than x-post from Natter, I'll just link to the post I made.

I'm Spiderman

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Congrats, Sean! I know that shit can be scary. I've never had to be Spider-Man, but I've been high up on Ladders of Doom and wall-crawling scaffolds to hang and adjust lights and I fear death and dismemberment.

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Dude. You KNOW your mom's non-dad kissing history? I sure as heck don't.

I was watching the History Channel with my mom and found out more of hers. It was kinda strange. There was a moment of, "Huh, this other guy could have been my dad. But then I wouldn't be me..." And then I stopped channeling Oz cause it was confusing.

I once again vote for more buffistas to move to Portland, because I want to move there. And I want people I know to already be there when I do.

::checks "Move to Portland" off list::

Hey, I'm going to start taking belly dancing classes

I just decided to do this as well. Friend brought it up tonight and it seemed like a fabulous idea. I think the classes start next month.

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I'm freaking out a teensy bit about my exam. (Just a teensy bit? Actually, yes.)

The format of this exam: it's an oral exam, two hours long. There are three professors asking questions that I have to answer, and anyone who wants to come watch it can. (Pretty much, this means most of my math friends who aren't going away for the summer will be there.) So far, so good. I'm reasonably confident that I know the material, and I've got no problems with public speaking.

The way the questions are asked is what's getting to me. Pretty much, the point is to test the depth of my knowledge of various areas of combinatorics. So, they'll pick some topic, start with questions to make sure I know the basics, then ask for more details. More analysis. More insight. This continues, until it gets to the point where I can't answer any more, and then they move on to the next topic.

I am horrible at being in a situation where I don't know the answer. And no matter how hard I prepare for this exam, there will be at least five or so times that I just have no idea what's going on, due to the format of the exam. And during my practice exams, this always ended up flustering me enough that I'd do much better on the first few topics than on the later ones, because by the time it got to the third or so topic, my brain was already in "I didn't know the answer! I didn't know the answer!" mode. And even though I know that it's expected that there will be times when I don't know the answer, I just can't get myself out of that mindset.

Hence, the mildly freaking out.

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Hence, the mildly freaking out.

Phew, perfectionism is hard work. I'm glad I don't have that issue.

So, here's my suggestion. Don't think about like it's a mythological test that you have to pass in order to get by the minotaur. Think about it if you were the teacher and just wanted to see the depth of knowledge of your student. You don't expect them to know everything yet. But you want them to have a clue. Show your cluefulness. Show your process.

You're making an error between your expectations for yourself and their expectations for you. You expect to be perfect. They don't. You need to recalibrate what you think you're being tested for. Not knowledge but overall functional understanding of combinatorics.

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I think it's more of a disconnect between my actual expectations for myself, and what I feel like I should expect from myself. I know that I'm not going to be able to answer everything. I don't expect to be able to, and frankly, it would really freak me out if I could answer everything, because then I'd think that the questions weren't hard enough. It's more that reflexive "you should know this" that's overriding the rational "I'm not going to know everything."

(I am going to be so glad when this exam is over. It's the last actual exam I have to get through -- all the formal things from now on are thesis-related things, so I have much more control over them. Well, I do still have the foreign language exam, but I'm not worrying about that one at all.)

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I can't even imagine taking an exam where by design it was inevitable I "fail" at some point, nevermind repeatedly. And I'm no where near a perfectionist.

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And I'm no where near a perfectionist.

::gives Trudy the secret handshake of imperfection::

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psst, David. I think you did that wrong.

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psst, David. I think you did that wrong.

::docks Cass imperfection points for correcting me, but gives her double points for doing it publically which is, of course, the wrong thing to do::

::gooses Cass. Gooses Trudy for good measure. Waits for Hil's ass to wander around in a distracted fashion...::

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