Repetitive Motion Injuries of the Mind
My shocking realization a couple of semesters ago is that graduate students are at high risk for insanity. Yes, insanity. That old proverb that says there’s a fine line between brilliance and insanity? Well, that’s us, mates.
When I was a kid, I saw the difference between brilliance and insanity in very clear-cut, very segmented and delineated terms. Smart people were on one end, wearing glasses and slightly odd but neat clothes, and these smart people probably did smart things like write books and teach. On the other end of the spectrum were the crazies — wild hair, nervous tics, and probably a lot of externalized inner dialogue. They tended to work in laboratories. Other average humans and I fell in the middle of that band with fashionable (not smart) glasses and fairly decent mind/mouth filters.
Enter grad school. I looked around and noticed most of us have developed eccentricities that make us a little socially odd. For example, it’s pretty reasonable around the Graduate Center to be a cat lady or to wear clothes that not only don’t match but are intentionally out of date. It’s acceptable to be addicted to caffeine (which is a hallucinogen in large quantities), talk to ourselves, and manifest geeky traits that aren’t cool in most other places, such as affinities for comic books, puns, or technology. Moreover, I discovered that not only do smart people teach and write books, but so do crazy people.
I began to understand that the brilliance/insanity distinction is on more of a continuum connecting the ends of a circle instead of a polarized scale. Brilliance and insanity truly are separated by a fine line (smudge?), because the mental ability that allows one to think abstractly “outside the box” enough to understand constructs and historical patterns is the same one that allows one to discard societal conventions and lead a life that is “crazy,” as it were. Some theorists argue that insanity is not madness at all, but the institutionally defined limit for acceptable societal behavior; the fear of being deemed insane acts, then, as a deterrent to straying from the herd. This is probably true for a lot of unfortunate cases — Nietzsche, arguably — but, on the other hand, there are definitely disabled minds out there, and some of them are actually in here, the Academy.
Before we resign to having “beautiful minds,” though, I’d like to point to what I think is a major culprit for us brilliant-slash-crazy academics: repetitive motion of the mind. The more one uses a certain body part, the higher risk one has of injuring it. Employers know this; hence, the field of ergonomics. Likewise, the more we academics use our brains, the greater chance we have of incurring mental injuries. And mental injury, friends, is eventually insanity.
So what are our repetitive motions? Think about regular close readings. Or skimming while constantly searching out patterns. Arcane analyses, critically doubting all claims, reading into metaphors, dissecting theory with logic, memorizing details, writing on command, competing with other students, and so on. Think about it: we’ve gotten to where we are because we’re really good at thinking too much. Add to that the other typical occupations of the mind: finances, dating, culture shock for many of us, and daily obstacles from subways to weather.
I’ll admit — it didn’t take long for me to feel the crazies. It was my first semester of hardcore theory in English when I began to wonder if the thoughts I was having were sane: I worried that I wasn’t smart enough, I couldn’t turn my mind off, things like that. I was sane, my professor assured me, but I was internalizing very high doses of convention-stretching theory and seriously engaging my own beliefs, resulting in a sore mind. The mental exercise was good, but, like an overworked back, my mind was tired, weakened, and less resilient. It needed to lie down and take a rest before tackling more work.
I found myself overworking my mind in other areas too, including one place where minds are not always helpful: relationships — and not just any relationship, but one with a fellow academic. There’s nothing quite like two academics who, having been trained and rewarded for over-thinking their entire lives, find themselves in a relationship between semesters. With nothing else to close-read, critique, analyze, or grade until the next semester began, my partner and I turned on each other and talked way too much about problems we didn’t have, but could conceivably have one day.
I shamelessly offer examples from my own experience, but I know plenty of other academics (who shall remain anonymous) who are suffering in the head a little too. One is beginning a sixth year of dissertation writing, another has regular panic attacks, and another just can’t get it together in general. Plenty of grad students suffer from horrible anxiety, and plenty others turn to mind-numbing or, alternately, mind-revving substances to help them deal with the pressures.
According to “Repetitive Motion Injuries” at E-Medicine Health, it’s time to go to the doctor when you experience “pain with movement of [affected areas], … pain that wakes you from sleep, [or]…inability to carry on normal activities of daily living” (4). These symptoms refer to physical injuries but cover mental injuries as well. Corresponding injuries as a result of repetitive brain motion may include, respectively: tender egos, insomnia, and paralyzing procrastination. Fortunately, we have free therapy available at the GC for 8-16 visits (their number is (212) 817-7020).
If the mind is like a muscle that can be overworked through repetitive motions, weight-training wisdom can be helpful. As physical fitness trainers say, the key is to stay balanced. A good workout regimen should alternate between different muscle groups on different days. This way, the tiny tears and injuries that occur during workout have a chance to heal before the next workout. Incidentally, it’s the rebuilding of that small bit of tissue damage that ultimately makes the muscle bigger and stronger. Accordingly, it’s good practice to engage in mental work that deconstructs our theories, but we should also give our brains a break — before those tiny tears and injuries build up to a more irreversible fragmentation.
Equipped with this new theory during my course work, I began trying to use the rest of my person to achieve mind/body/soul balance — no, really! I didn’t want to be a crazy old bat by the time I finish my doctorate, so I signed up for a ballet class, I made time for coffee talk with friends, and I tried to find some sort of spiritual practice with which I felt comfortable. I made it a point to read for pleasure sometimes, and to simply listen to music on the subway or people-watch instead of force-feeding myself some essay for a class. And when I just couldn’t avoid huge amounts of analytical reading, I tried to balance it out by doing something physical at the same time — pacing and reading aloud, alternating arm weights for each page (a good incentive to read faster), working on my ballet releves, or holding some awful yoga position.
Wonder of wonders, it worked. I felt normal again and finished all my course work with no incompletes or extensions. That said, it’s a little suspicious when these repetitive brain injuries are epidemic in graduate school, and for that I’d like to thank the Academy. There’s clearly something in the graduate school machine that produces procrastination and stress in students so predictably that the GC preemptively offers those specific therapy sessions every semester.
Speaking of procrastination, I’ve reached that notorious phase in grad school during which all grad students supposedly find themselves awash in a sea of mental torture: orals. I remember one of my professors scoffing when I said I’d finish my orals in six months. With the amount of reading I did for my classes, I thought six months was plenty of time to read 90 texts. Now that I’m here, though, I’m having a hard time getting, uh, motivated. I’ve tried Spider Solitaire, but it didn’t work. In fact, I continue to try it almost daily, and it’s still not working, so I don’t recommend that route, unless you’re practicing for a good cause, such as a Spider Solitaire championship with another grad student on the cusp of crazy, or maybe for one day when a psychotic criminal threatens to destroy the world unless you alone can beat that Spider Solitaire game on difficult (it could happen).
Seriously, colleagues, it’s easy to get burned out academically, so let’s make sure to schedule a little time off — let our minds lie down and rest a bit when they need it — and engage in some healthy extras like consorting with folks we’re fond of and indulging in punny jokes for our inner geeks.
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