When I was finally coming into terms that I will extend my undergraduate for at least another year, I came across a roundtable discussion that my research adviser joined over a year ealier.

In an online fireside chat hosted by the Philippine-American Academy of Science and Engineering, Dr. May Lim gave an advice to her younger, scientist self: to be kinder, not just to other people, but also to yourself.

“Just relax a bit. There’s time to go through all that. Everyone will understand eventually,” she said.

The first quarter of 2023, in particular, was a particularly rough patch in my UP stay. Apart from the daily grind of being the Collegian editor-in-chief, I just plainly hated myself for not doing great in my academics and research work. That was my supposed final semester, yet I was simply submitting requirements for my classes mindlessly and skipping research consultations altogether. I wasn’t going to graduate that semester, I told myself, but I was also tricking myself by claiming “it ain’t over till it’s over.” Of course, the scientific process takes time—it will not magically produce results or write itself when the scientist does not devote enough time. It was a sham of a thinking.

Because I thought that I was deficient in one aspect, I had to compensate in other aspects. So, in a carefully choreographed act of self-sabotage, I started working late in the office, trying to finish the gargantuan administrative and financial matters on my own. I did that while casually browsing my notes and class materials just so I don’t feel guilty that I am neglecting my academics.

Fast forward to the end of the semester, I incurred my first-ever INC (for the thesis), and got a grade of 2.50 in the course that my adviser was teaching because all my submissions were late (significantly). I ran the sprint, felt so tired toward the end of the academic year, and came out empty-handed.

My term ended and I told my adviser I will take the entire midyear term off. I said this will be the first real break I will have in years, having spent my last three midyear terms taking classes. My thinking was, perhaps, I needed a breather to recalibrate and regroup. Hopefully, the few weeks of doing nothing will allow me to achieve a monk-like inner peace, and suddenly be better and productive.

*

Kulê’s travel to Davao in August 2023 was a particular turning point. I had to basically excuse myself for the entire convention days because I need to turn in a thesis outline—“what do I want to do and how would I want to achieve it?” was our prompt. For the first time in nearly a year, I forced myself to read again my related literature and recall the first principles. In the end, I created a one-page manuscript outline with a tentative working title. It was well-received during the research meeting, and proceeded to slowly expand the outline.

Indeed, it gets better, albeit in a frustratingly slow manner.

Progress wasn’t much noticeable at first, but my LaTeX file slowly started getting longer and the hyperlinks were adding up. The proto-thesis was still crap, but it was getting done. One only needed to sit, take time and write. If we have to print one page of progress per day and discuss it, we should, my adviser suggested. It’s all in the head, apparently—tricking the brain that you’re progressing is just as essential as the quantitative measure of progress (in this case, chapters and pages).

*

I wish I knew that lesson early on. I entered UP without assuming that it’s easy, nor that everything will go as planned. As I wrote in my thesis acknowledgements, I have encountered a lot of detours, delays, and dismays. Too many to mention.

However, it’s one thing to acknowledge that hardships exist. It’s an entirely different thing to accept that struggling is an important aspect. The last five years taught me that struggling is a nonnegotiable prerequisite in attaining improvement. It’s the law of life as professed by self-help books; it’s dialectical materialism as told by Karl Marx.

By shrugging off the fact that I was having difficulty and hating myself for feeling that way, I have inadvertently made my situation worse—and it’s no longer confined to academics. Nobody wants to feel inferior. It’s only human to sulk in sadness when we’re frustrated that we can’t do something out of sheer skill issue. But learning how to handle one’s disappointment and find the courage to continue is more important.

How to get unstuck in life was something that my fifth year in UP taught me. Going by doesn’t mean movement or progress. Sometimes, it’s just an acknowledgment that you’ve maxed out your skills and you need help. Sometimes, it’s finding courage to ask a dumb question. Sometimes, it’s making a mistake so you will remember not to do it again. Sometimes, it’s just being kinder to yourself because it gets better—either by your own making or by the world’s own making.

*

Certainly, I would’ve done some things differently in my undergraduate years, now that I have the benefit of hindsight. Certainly, being kinder is one of those. Being kind to oneself isn’t just the usual self-niceties of a consumerist concept of “self-care,” rather, it includes an admission and acceptance of your own humanity—that you’re fragile and fallible. It is also an acknowledgment that there are great people out there who can help you. And you only need to ask them.

Undergraduate and life, in general, are hard because the system is rigged against us. And one does not take on the system alone.

UP has allowed me to encounter a bunch of great people who are always willing to lend a helping hand without expecting anything in return. Indeed, it takes a village to raise a scientist. There is nothing more fun than being surrounded with people who are also struggling, who are also having a hard time yet curious still to unlock the secrets of the universe. To them I owe this degree—a proof that indeed, it gets better sometimes.

Of course, there’s no denying that the education system requires us to finish it within a specified time period. And the system imposes penalties for those who don’t. If I only I could, I would’ve forced myself to graduate in 2023 already—there’s little point in extending. It will not hurt, however, to be kinder on oneself despite taking a bit more time in college. Had the conditions been ideal and perfect, everyone will be graduating “on time.” It’s not an ideal world. We all have our own peculiarities.

*

There’s no point in advising my old self to be kinder because it gets better eventually. So I am instead leaving this note to my future self: Be kinder. There’s time to go through all the readings. You will understand them eventually. Remember those because you’ve already soldiered through and somehow survived it.

A pre-Sablay essay has been published on July 24, 2024.

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