A Scientific Method

I am not special.

Right now, I am just like every other twenty-something trying to figure out my future. Sure, I've got big ideas but having a plan doesn't mean it's all going to work out. 

 

A few months ago I had an idea, after getting PhD rejections... For the third application season, what if I shared the evolution of my story?

 

It started as a joke, as an idea for a book of essays including all of my personal statements over the years. Things change, and maybe somone could learn from my mistakes. If we dissected my personal statements paragraph by paragraph, commenting on their evolution, something has to become apparent. The longer that I sat with the idea, the more I realised that this wasn't a book, it was a blog. 

 

Anonymity was going to be my game, but these statements have been read by at least a hundred people at this point. 

 

Think about it: 

With an average of 7 universities and about 3 reviewers over 3 years we have 63 readers. Plus there was my army of proofreaders: my friends and family, bringing the grand total to 78 people. And we can't forget those readers who thought it was so absurd and ridiculous they showed it to everyone they could get their hands on. That has to put is close to 100 readers.

 

At this point,

what is a few extra hundred?

 

It is just so difficult to censor these at this point, since they are personal statements. There's just too much of me in it to generalize. I'm not publicizing my or anyone elses name, but I'm not hiding it either. It's simple enough. 

 

 

So here I go, sharing my story one essay at a time and maybe learning something along the way.