Why I Do What I Do

A friend mentioned to me that I have so many activities in spite of working towards my PhD while I was chatting with her last two weeks. I admit that I have quite a number of things on my plate. I have my gardening, cooking, baking and I just started crocheting. Oh! I read too in my spare time, not journals obviously. Truth is none of these take my focus away from my PhD. That friend is not the only one who questioned me about my outside-PhD-activities.

Thing is I don't think that working 24-7 towards my PhD will give me full life satisfaction. I want to enjoy life. Of course I want to finish on time but so far I don't get any negative comments from either of my supervisors. Well except for 'Stop being a perfectionist' and 'It's alright to be criticized.'

I have the honour of meeting few undergrad students(now graduated)-mostly medic students here in Newcastle whom in spite of their busy schedule manage to do charity works for both Malay community and Muslim community. Mind you, that's not on a yearly basis, some of the charity works that they did requires their weekly/monthly commitment.

Not to mentioned my own students, well ex-students. I know some of them were actively involced in co-curricular activities but still managed to do well in their studies. Yes, people might argue that that are undergraduate level, so it is not the same with PhD. I'm not saying its the same. All I'm saying is one can still do well in their work/study even if one do not pour all of himself into his work/study.

Back to why I do what I do. I just want to do something which can take my mind off my PhD if just for a while. I am a liar if I said I have accomplished that. Honestly when I am deep in my thinking process, my brain keeps working, searching for 'THE' solution, even though I was cooking or baking or even sleeping at that time. Many times, I get ideas while I am baking or gardening. So it's not a waste of time anyway. More so, it's not like I spent my whole day gardening, or baking, or cooking.

I share my love for gardening with my husband. So that's a bonding time there. Watching our plants to grow not just give us pure joy but make us in awe of Allah's creations; a not so pretty bulb can turns into a bunch of beautiful lilies.

Same with goes cooking and baking. My husband loves cooking. The time I spend on cooking is also the quality time I spend with my husband. But sometimes it also becomes our 'battleground'. Hahaha... Not a real battleground though. Just sometimes I will obstinately ignore his suggestion (just to tease him), be it the way we are supposed to cook certain recipes or the revision for tomorrow's menu.

I think what really matters is what my supervisors think of me. As long as they are happy with my work, why should I care about others. Surely I have to keep my sponsors happy too. Plus later I can put in another factor like journals' editorial board to which I will submit my papers into my list of need-to-keep-these-parties-happy.