I spend a good chunk of my work time on my way to do workshops or thinking about travel. I check train times and maps, I think about taxis, I look for hotels…
…is it any wonder my dreams skew towards weird worlds where train times change while you’re in motion? Where I move at a glacial pace through a hotel with confusing rooms, and arrive for work late and unready to do things… I really hate being late. I hate trains being cancelled. They’re my bane, my nightmare situations. And so when my brain decides to mix things up, it feeds these thoughts back to me in IMAX Dream-O-Vision.
What’s your worst case scenario for your viva? What do you worry about?
I’ve often thought that last-minute postponement would be bad, or a fire alarm going off on the day. Candidates often build themselves up to defend their thesis. If I was to find out with little warning the viva was not going ahead, I could understand how that would be frustrating.
Maybe a worst case scenario is silence in the viva. Or being worried that you’ll go blank. From the questions people regularly ask me I know these situations are in candidates’ minds.
I hate being late. It’s my worst case scenario, so I do something about it. I check distances beforehand. I bookmark map locations. I have an app on my phone to consult about trains now.
I can’t turn my dreams off, but they show up less frequently.
Worst case scenarios are, thankfully, rarely reality. What’s yours? Think about it, write down what it would be like. Now, accepting this is unlikely to happen, what can you do to act against the worst of it?
Probably more than you think.
