Sunday Morning Buddha.

As the semester winds down and I contemplate my next seven semesters of grad school*, (while simultaneously contemplating the quality of a small sample of my students' work), I would like to pass along an important life lesson.

The lesson? B = Ph.D.

What's that? It's a mantra. A reminder. A calming, soothing, yoga-breathing relaxation buzzword.

And what does it mean? Calm down. It's okay to pull yourself way from PsycInfo and call it good with the 20 articles you already have. It's okay to put off the papers due this week because you planned to run a marathon over the weekend. It's okay to put together a presentation in the 30 minutes before you stand up present. In the end, you will finish the paper and turn it in on time. You will give the presentation. You'll finish the reading, or at least some of it - but enough to contribute something to the discussion. And in the process, you'll be able to enjoy the huge part of life that isn't at all related to school. It means that it's okay to get a B. You can get a B in every class and still graduate and still get that Dr. in front of your name (or behind it... either way).

It can be difficult to accept the truth of B = Ph.D., to let go of perfection as the ultimate goal and embrace a "do what you can" attitude. The process is made even more difficult if you, like me, hold the A in rather high esteem.

But I promise that, if you can bring yourself to the point of letting go of perfection and accepting life as is, it's so worth it. I think there's a parallel between B = Ph.D. and the Mindfulness movement in psychotherapy (I'd like to give a quick shout-out to Buddihsm's embrace of mindfulness a really long time ago, way before the psychotherapeutic community got our hands on it). Mindfulness involves stopping, being aware what's happening around you and within you, and not judging these things as good or bad. Both B = Ph.D. and Mindfulness allow a person to stop the constant process of analyzing and judging and worrying about what's happening, and instead to start noticing things and letting them go.

I share my thoughts with you here because I think that being me, instead of striving to be _____ (fill in the blank there...), is a healthy way to live no matter what your circumstances. In the end, I believe that people get more out of experiences if they are being instead of striving. I will come out of graduate school a better person for letting go of the A+ mindset, I will be a better wife if I let go of the perfect wifey mindset, I will someday be a better mother if I let go of all of the rules and expectations (real or perceived, from me and from others) of motherhood. Being allows me to experience today. And it's a beautiful day.

*Dependent entirely on funding, as I already get teary-eyed thinking about how happy I'll make Sallie Mae's employees during my ten years of loan repayment someday. See? I experience the awareness of thousands of dollars of debt, I feel it, and I let it go. It's not good or bad. It just is.