Sunday I stepped on a plane to Rome. This research visit kicks off the second half of my PhD. At the airport, I looked back on the first two years. The excitement I feel for staying at ESA’s 𝚽-Lab mirrors my feelings about my PhD's future. It’s been a ride, but I don’t want it to stop. I’m looking forward to the next loopings; I’ll take them with my eyes open.

I want to look back on what I learned over the past two years and peek over the horizon for what the next years will bring me.

One thing stands out after reading the blog I wrote a year ago about the first year of my PhD. I’m way more confident than the version of me that wrote that blog. She struggled with planning and wanting to know all the next steps. She got nervous stomach cramps opening results for the first time, worried about having messed up. She felt self-conscious about blogging and reading about scicomm. Nobody had asked her to; what would her supervisors think?

Ever since I moved from a Master’s thesis to a PhD, I started losing ownership over my research. I wasn’t just an unpaid master’s student anymore. Now I was in a paid position with responsibility towards my supervisors. I responded by making fewer and fewer decisions myself. When I had a question, I would ask my supervisors. While I waited for their response, I shook down Google Scholar for The Answer. One day, I was scanning papers to find out how to compile a deep ensemble. All the same model but trained with different random seeds, or different models altogether? A thought stopped me in my tracks: why didn’t I try to answer this question by myself first? What the hell is this brain and my degrees for?

This revelation coincided with me starting to write more to organise my thoughts. Very naturally, I started to seek answers in writing. What a difference this made: I think much clearer with everything on “paper”, instead of floating in my head. And each question I answered myself boosted my confidence like gravity assists.

Many more drops fell in the bucket: talking with peers, insights from courses and books and joy when I followed my heart. In Atomic Habits, James Clear writes that you have to gather evidence to prove to yourself that you’re not an impostor. I gathered evidence by completely changing my research workflow, writing blogs and reading about scicomm. I started to take the time to plan things, instead of rushing into them.

My new confidence has shifted the ground from under me – in a good way. I don’t worry as much any more, and I enjoy my PhD way more since I follow my gut more. I had gotten way too good at forcing myself to do tasks. I started saying no to things that I did not believe in--gathering evidence that actually, not much happens when you say no. Supervisors support you and give you suggestions and ideas, but in the end, you are the expert on your own topic. You have to evaluate which analyses will take you closer to your vision.

Another surprise: the process of developing myself is really fun. I’m used to thinking that you have to toil and suffer to get anything done. But I actually learned way more by following my heart. I learn much better and faster if I care about a topic, like presenting. What can I say, headstrong people need to experience before believing.

This is where I am now. I’m more confident. Following my gut gave me purpose. I embraced my love for writing, presenting, storytelling, and drawing instead of pushing it off as “irrelevant” or “frivolous”. And I’m optimistic: I’m excited about what I will learn, instead of how I might fail.

✨ Self-authorship ✨, I think that about covers it.

I used to be scared about permanence, about doing something that I might be ashamed of later. I never felt that way about tattoos, though. When my grandma asks me, “Won’t you regret it when you’re old?” I say, “No, even if my style changes, these tattoos are snapshots of who I was at the moment I got them.” So, let’s make a snapshot for next year, or 2 years after that, when I have my doctorate. I’m excited about three things:

1. Do a short research project for once (coughs in 2-year-first-project), which will train my “no”-muscle.
2. Do a project with another PhD or a Post-doc. I want to gain experience with collaboration, and be a bit less lonely at work.
3. Connect with more like-minded people: scicomm or research vision. After covid, it took me a really long time to open up again to new relationships, but I’m ready. Hit me up when you want a coffee :)

I think nr 3 is already going to happen this month, at Phi-lab.. Rochelle, my contact at ESA told me: “I don’t think you’re going to do much coding this month. You’ll be having chats and coffees with everyone here and meet lots of new people.”

Sounds damn good to me.

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