Overcoming Feelings of Inadequacy

(the first half of this might appear to be bragging...just keep reading)

It ocurred to me last night, in the midst of my funk, that the problem I'm having is somewhat new for me. School is a game that I've always been able to win. Despite whatever momentary feelings of inadequacy I harbor, I've always been able to accomplish what I wanted, academically anyway. I was an honors student from second grade on; I racked up prizes through junior high and high school; I went to college on full scholarship, and I graduated with honors in both majors, with my picture hanging on the wall of the student union for a year. Even though I barely squeaked into graduate school (my GRE scores were *abysmal*), I ended up passing my comprehensive exams with "distinction," won prizes for best graduate papers in the two fields I worked in, and was recognized as the outstanding student in the program before I graduated. I got a tenure track job at a fabulous SLAC, and then I went on the market and landed a job at an R1 institution. And that, folks, is when everything changed.

For all of the accomplishments above, I've always *felt* inadequate. In college, I had to reread one of my own papers every time I sat down to write because I couldn't imagine what a paper needed to do. I was sure I wouldn't make it through my first year of grad school (clearly I barely made it into the program!). I didn't think I'd be able to pass my comps. My academic life, in other words, has been a series of feelings of inadequacy followed by an accomplishment that said "okay, you can do this," and then the cycle started over. So I'm in a slumpy cycle, thinking not about the pieces of writing that have been recently accepted for publication but the book manuscripts that haven't been. I'm working at a place where my colleagues (for the most part) are well-established and even super-stars in their fields. I'm at a place that I really don't think I can succeed (emotionally I've been here many times before) and the recognition seems far off and impossible to reach. Maybe this is as far as I can go. Maybe I'm really not good enough to publish a book. Yesterday at the "free books" table at school I found a book written by someone I knew in grad school; he was an undergraduate at the time. I thought the name sounded familiar and looked at the cover on the back; he's clearly a man now, not an adolescent boy, but it's the same person. He's done more than I have. And that hit me pretty hard.

It's easy to think about all that I *haven't* accomplished or won this year (book contests, grants) and all that hasn't gone right. In most cases, I try to ignore all that and keep plugging away at my work, because I *do* value the work for its own sake, regardless of whatever gets taken by publishers. (I've been in the business long enough to know that at a certain point what gets taken--in my field--isn't necessarily the "best") But the larger context in which I work--an R1 institution--recognizes only the finished product that's been given a stamp of approval by a publisher or government agency. And I really wonder if I've reached my limit as a writer.