[rant alert]

During my PhD journey, I struggled a lot with motivation.

An unnamed postdoc once commented to me, "if publishing a paper doesn't motivate you, I don't know how to motivate you."

To people in academia for a long time, publishing to them is almost like breathing.

Got to publish to get jobs, grants, tenure, awards, etc.

But you see, the problem I had was that I had already signed a contract. Yeah, that contract that I signed a long time ago.

No matter how many papers I publish, no matter what journals I publish in, no matter what H-index I get. The result is the same.

I go home and work at A*STAR in Singapore for 5 years (special circumstances may apply).

So, I'd often ask myself this first question, "why am I doing this?"

And I would reply to myself, to get my PhD as per the contract.

That was the bare minimum: getting a PhD.
That's it.

When it comes to motivation and doing research, I often ask myself this second question, "why am I doing this research work?"

Quite often, my own personal answer is "to help my friend publish a paper to help them get a faculty job in the future".

My life is going to be pretty much OK. I don't have to publish high-impact papers to get a faculty job.

I'm actually quite happy to be a postdoc for life and getting that USD$40-60k/year for the next 60 years.

BUT only if I believe in the research work I'm doing.

The third question I ask myself is "why is my PI running a lab?"

(I might get into trouble for writing this)

Is it to advance science?
Train more scientists?
Teach classes?

I am not sure and I don't know. I also have not dared to ask.

The fourth question I ask myself is about the collaborations in our lab (which focuses on fluorescence microscopy).

"Why does this project exist?"

"Why can't they just go to a microscopy core facility and do it themselves?"

"Why do we have to subject a PhD student to this?"

If the biological application can only be answered with our specialized methods, sure!

If the biological application shows off a unique aspect of our specialized methods, sure!

If it is just 2D 2-color super-res microscopy, why don't they go to a microscopy core facility?

What does the PhD student get out of the collaboration?
A paper? (I don't need that)
A PhD? (I could have worked on another methods development project that I'm more interested in)

And that's the gist of my low levels of motivation during my PhD.

I helped someone else image their sample.
They left for a job midway.
I took over the entire project.
I wasn't allowed to work on methods development.
I was marked down on evals about motivation.

So #DearPI, do ask your students what projects they are interested in working on. Maybe allow them to have at least two projects (high risk vs low risk, high interest vs low interest, not chosen vs chosen).

Being motivated is a feeling that I miss having.
That's also one of the many reasons why I like to hang out on Twitter and read about the amazing optics/microscopy work that others are doing.
Because that is what I'm interested in.