PhD Tales from the Couch: The Age of Anxiety

“It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair, we had everything before us, we had nothing before us …”

This quote from A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens can perhaps sum up the feeling of anxiety we all experience at certain times, when our life flip flops between complete despair and a promise of success. This may be especially true if you are a graduate student or a post-doc dealing with work-related stress brought about by a number of factors.  As someone in a trainee position at the start of our scientific careers in the academic or corporate hierarchy, we are no strangers to stress. We work in the environment loaded with anxiety triggers: sometimes we feel powerless working in a state of perpetual uncertainty and lack of control, always exposed to extreme competitiveness and limited resources, long working hours, failed experiments, harsh criticism from reviewers or committee members, unrealistic demands from the adviser, and let’s not forget the “Publish or Perish” formula of the Ivory Tower. An article titled Grad School Blues published in The Chronicle Review reports that “Graduate school is gaining a reputation as an incubator for anxiety and depression.” As such, we are chronically exposed to anxiety triggers.

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Anxiety is a natural response

So what is the answer, you might ask. Should we sacrifice graduate education and a career in science to avoid all this anxiety?  For those of you who, after reading this article, decided to say goodbye to your graduate career, STOP! This, of course, is not what I am suggesting. Anxiety is a part of life and a natural response that by itself it is neither good nor bad. However, it is how we react under such situations that determines our ability to withstand stress. In fact, when faced with a challenge some anxiety is actually advantageous, because it provides the necessary push to work harder under duress. This is because anxiety is an ancient survival mechanism inherited from our ancestors: the fight-or-flight reflex. If not for our ability to increase performance under stress, human species might have never outlived cyber-toothed tigers or the ice age. However, our ancient survival system has not quite caught up with the modern world. Sometimes, triggers that are not necessarily life threatening, like presenting data to an audience or stress associated with a lack of job prospects, can eventually induce a chronic state of anxiety and diminish our work efficiency. Our inability to fine-tune the anxiety response eventually nips away at our resilience in the face of everyday challenges, leading to depression. With time, such stress can wear out our enthusiasm and mental state, leading to a state of “tunnel vision” in the workplace. Just remember how excited and idealistic you were when applying for graduate school?  Now fast forward to year 4 or 5 of your grad school experience … do you feel disgruntled and lack purpose? This dangerous trend and high burn-out rates, combined with a feeling of perpetual transition and instability, can sap even the most resilient and the brightest.

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How to deal with anxiety

So, if anxiety is a built-in response and can actually be helpful in moderate doses, we can do anything not to succumb to the downward spiral?   How do we minimize anxiety and develop resilience to shake off work-related stress?  While we may not control the factors that contribute to anxiety, we can try to be in control of how we react to and handle them. Here I am providing some advice on how to handle anxiety:

1) Minimize anxiety by setting achievable short-term goals. It does not hurt to plan far into the future. However, it is very helpful to plan bite-sized achievable goals that you can accomplish in a week, or a month. This way you will feel that you are making progress and identify areas that require more of your attention. This approach helps you feel more productive and positive when you achieve these goals, without setting yourself up for a long-haul goal that might not yield results.

2) Taking care of yourself and feeling positive is essential to the mental and physical health. Exercises is a good way to invigorate yourself, release stress, clear your head, and re-focus mentally because during exercise our bodies release endorphins that provide a natural boost of positive energy. For example, during my graduate studies I started training in Krav Maga, a very rigorous and practical self-defense system, which did wonders because it allowed me to refocus my mind from work-related issues and feel positive and re-energized (not to mention that I learned self-defense and improved my confidence!).

3) Establish work-life balance and change pace. We need to strive to establish a good work-life balance to avoid burnout. Taking breaks during the workday and going for walks can help prevent stress and tension buildup. Any sort of positive and reinforcing activity, such as travel, spending time with friends, hiking, going to a museum, etc, can help break up monotonous routine we sometimes face and combat anxiety.

4) Seek support from colleagues. Your colleagues may be experiencing the same stress and frustrations as you are, and may have found productive ways to cope and resolve them. You are not alone, and it helps to feel some solidarity and encouragement from your peers. You should not feel ashamed or embarrassed of what you are feeling, and reach out for peer support. There might already be support groups or networks established for this purpose. If not, then perhaps you can take initiate and organize a support group, which will address the work-related anxiety and also make you feel more positive and in control. However, it is important not to continuously dwell on negative emotions when sharing with your peers, because it could serve as an incubator for negativity and result in further demoralization and anxiety. Instead, try to be positive and supportive of other people, and you will feel positive yourself. Some institutions have complementary well-being and mental health services with trained professionals who address specific issues that scientists may have in the workplace.

5) Talk with your supervisor. Hopefully you are on friendly and professional terms with your boss, and they actually care about your well-being. It is important to talk to your supervisor if you feel unhappy about your current project or work direction. Often, they may be able to provide you with the perspective you need to feel like you are doing a better job, or redirect your efforts so that you feel more productive

6) Do not beat yourself up. It may turn out that much of your stress is self-imposed. Are you setting yourself up for unrealistic expectations? Are you pushing yourself too hard and not acknowledging your accomplishments? Refer to advise #1 on setting up achievable short-term goals. It could be that you are being too tough of a self-critic and cause your anxiety by never being satisfied with your work. Do not destroy your self-confidence by constantly denigrating yourself, but instead reward yourself for getting things done.  We can ruminate on negative thoughts and thus breed anxiety in our minds. Do not beat yourself up for making mistakes, we all make them, and remember to move on and focus on what is at hand.

7) Identify the causes of your anxiety.  Think carefully about what it is that is causing you to feel anxious. Is it anything that you can change? Is there anything that you can change about yourself to avoid feeling this way? You cannot worry about things over which you have no control. You may realize that some things you worry about are not problems at all, but rather that your mind just tends to over-think them and cause you to feel anxious. Ask yourself if you are getting as much satisfaction from your work as you once did and if you are as productive as you once were. If after realistically assessing your job satisfaction and workplace productivity, you determine that you are really unhappy and your goals are unattainable, then perhaps either your work setting is toxic, or your attitude is incompatible with the current work setting (or both). In this case you should seriously think about changing your line or place or work.  To avoid anxiety and work-related burnout, you should do what you love, which would allow you to grow as a person and feel positive about what you do, rather than causing you more pain and anxiety.

8) Avoid negativity. Avoid spending time around negative people, they are like black-holes for your well-being and will drain you of positive energy. If certain settings and people cause you to feel negative, minimize your exposure to them. Anything that causes you to feel negative emotions will only exacerbate your anxiety. This also extends to interactions outside your work, including personal relationships. You will end up bringing this negativity with you to work, which is likely to make you feel more stressed and susceptible to anxiety at work.  Same goes for any other sources that make you feel negative: news, TV, etc. Instead, try to spend time with people and visit places that make you feel positive and energized, as mentioned in advices 2, 3, and 4.

Hopefully these 8 simple suggestions will help you fight off and overcome anxiety issues that we face every day. Since I started this article with a quote, let me finish it with one: “Drag your thoughts away from your troubles … by the ears, by the heels, or any other way you can manage it.”  – Mark Twain

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Yevgeniy grew up in New York, but decided to transplant himself to the West Coast for his PhD studies at the Scripps Research Institute, where he studied mechanisms of gene regulation in the immune system. Recently, Yevgeniy again found himself in New York City, pursuing a post-doctoral research project in oncology. In his spare time Yevgeniy works as a Krav Maga self-defense instructor, and as a scientific writer to share his passion for fostering communication between the scientific community and the public.

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How do you manage anxiety in lab?

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