Research Research!!

As my readers must have noticed, there is a pronounced spiritual influence in my writing over the last few months. I was a bit upset about this turn and scared of getting my readers bored but I realized that there is a reason for this sudden hypsochromic shift .
Research does that to you. It is funny how getting a research degree can make you turn into a completely different person.
Behind every positive result, there are at least about a dozen negative results and failures. These include everything from old instruments to forgetful administrative staff. Behind every experiment there is a long painful wait either for chemicals or reaction conditions.
So at the end of a particularly "bad results" week you find yourself asking the same set of questions that you did the last time you went through bad results.
1) Why am I here?
2) Would it be better if I were in India doing a job and getting married?
3) Why do I wake up early and walk so much if I am not certain of positive results?
4) Is this floating around like a cloud my destiny?
5) When will I get a job that lets me get a taxi whenever I feel like?
6) Life can be so easy and so difficult at the same time!
7) Should I just take a break this weekend so that I turn a bit more positive?
8) Am I over rating myself when I think that I can finish this well?
10) I haven't seen aai-baba and ajji in such a long time!
11) I wish I were in India right now!

Some days this goes on all day. Every solution you make has the potential of being dangerously lined with your tears and exactly at that point, you get a really good result. You get something that you can almost see printed proudly in your thesis and the day turns around for you. It happens at such a right time that there is no denying that it must have a Divine intervention. God waits for you to get at your miserable best and then throws a piece of chocolate at you. It is annoying and reassuring at the same time.

What is remarkable about this cycle is the fact that it never lets you get too full of yourself. It never lets you believe that you are riding on a high tide. It never makes you feel that you are important. You have almost no control over what might happen next. All you can do is keep yourself well-read and well-fed to take your next result. Even the positive results are not all sugar and cinnamon. One positive result opens up five different roads to further studies and then you have to choose your own by traveling a bit on each one of them.
By the time you are half way through, your research puts you on a leash and takes you wherever it wants to go. You just have to make sense out of what you get. :)

You can find a really interesting "thought for the day" ( which has been there for the last four months) in our chemistry lab. It says, ' Every dipole has its moment' and every time I read it I tell myself I am a dipole too!
I don't know where I am heading but everyday I know a bit more about myself and every positive result gets be closer to being best buddies with God. :)
Cheers!