No Eulogies
I've been watching and rewatching this scene recently. It's from a relatively unknown movie (I think). A very good film. This scene, the ending, is one of the reasons why. Everything in here is so finely paced. So gentle, but so stirring at the same time.
I'll still be continuing to tutor at my university for the coming semester. A different module this time round though, one I've never tutored before. I've got pretty good feedback from my students last semester. I was quite surprised by that, for three reasons. 1) I've intentionally limited interactivity in my tutorials. By and large I thought this would turn many people off, since people probably don't want to listen to someone speak in front of them for too long in tutorials. On the contrary, though, some people seemed to like this. They indicated this by either stating so directly, in their (anonymous) online feedback forms, or indirectly, by stating that one of the strengths in the tutorial was that they learned a lot. There are definitely tradeoffs in any method of tutoring, and it was moderately surprising to see that people seemed to appreciate this method more than not.
2) I thought I stumbled a few times during class. I'm not a strong facilitator for spontaneous discussions or questions, and I think there were times where I didn't handle them well enough. I thought there were also times where I rumbled on too long, repeated myself too many times. None of that seemed to come up though (well, apart from one comment). This isn't my first time observing this, and I think the take-home point from this is that more often than not, people don't care about some lapses or some weak showings as much as you think they do, as long as you've made some reasonably decent showings elsewhere.
3) I didn't depart much from what I did the previous semester. I got decent feedback then, but feedback this time round was significantly better. It could simply be statistical aberration, or maybe little refinements here and there did indeed make things a lot better. I was somewhat more confident in my jokes this time round; I improved in my delivery somewhat, if only because I've told those jokes before. Maybe practice really does make perfect. Still not perfect though - one of the comments was that I can afford to be more confident in my jokes. That is certainly an area that I will look to improve in.
I was quite glad receiving the feedback I got, not least because I wasn't really expecting it. But I've got to move on now. Taking on a completely new class with completely new content means I've got to think of completely new jokes.
I'll still be writing my thesis, even though it's beyond my scholarship duration. But that's fine - my school fees are waived, and I'm receiving pay for tutoring for the department; the latter is something I would have aimed for, even if I'd completed my work long ago. In effect then, nothing much has changed.
If you might be wondering why I'm dilly-dallying so much, let me put forth two main reasons here. First, I think I had, at least on some subconscious level, decided I wouldn't go all-out applying for Phd programs this year. Two years of break would be good - that would be time enough to rejuvenate myself, maybe do some creative writing, brush up on my philosophical and scientific knowledge. Thus in some sense, there was no real reason why I needed to rush things out.
Perhaps the more important reason though, is that I'm a person who's not motivated to fill in work that I've already done in my head already. I gleaned this insight from someone I met some months ago, a JC friend. Then, she had looked at me in the eyes and told me (perhaps with a smile too), that she had no doubt, no doubt at all that I would finish my work in time. She said this because she had a fiancé who was working on his Phd thesis but procrastinating himself, and she said that we're just running away from what we knew needed to be done. I was quite taken aback at this actually, in a good way, because it came from someone whom I haven't been in close touch with for years; and yet she said what she said with such earnest confidence, with no hesitation at all.
She's wrong in a way, because I haven't finished my work within my scholarship candidature. But 'in time' doesn't necessarily refer to that. It could just refer to the time that my body acknowledges to be most reasonable to complete in. And since my body had, at least on some subconscious level, decided not to go all-out for Phd application this year, it just means that that time has been further pushed back. At any rate, I think it is indeed true that I feel less excited, or less motivated, to complete projects to the very end. Some people feel motivated to have a polished, finished product on their hands - that makes it easier for them to finish up their work. I don't. I feel motivated thinking through a new project - just thinking through. And once I think I've solved it in my head, or at least once I think I've got a rough outline in place, I start to look for a new project to chew on.
In any case, I'll be looking to finish this as soon as possible, so I can really enjoy taking my classes.
I'll still be continuing to tutor at my university for the coming semester. A different module this time round though, one I've never tutored before. I've got pretty good feedback from my students last semester. I was quite surprised by that, for three reasons. 1) I've intentionally limited interactivity in my tutorials. By and large I thought this would turn many people off, since people probably don't want to listen to someone speak in front of them for too long in tutorials. On the contrary, though, some people seemed to like this. They indicated this by either stating so directly, in their (anonymous) online feedback forms, or indirectly, by stating that one of the strengths in the tutorial was that they learned a lot. There are definitely tradeoffs in any method of tutoring, and it was moderately surprising to see that people seemed to appreciate this method more than not.
2) I thought I stumbled a few times during class. I'm not a strong facilitator for spontaneous discussions or questions, and I think there were times where I didn't handle them well enough. I thought there were also times where I rumbled on too long, repeated myself too many times. None of that seemed to come up though (well, apart from one comment). This isn't my first time observing this, and I think the take-home point from this is that more often than not, people don't care about some lapses or some weak showings as much as you think they do, as long as you've made some reasonably decent showings elsewhere.
3) I didn't depart much from what I did the previous semester. I got decent feedback then, but feedback this time round was significantly better. It could simply be statistical aberration, or maybe little refinements here and there did indeed make things a lot better. I was somewhat more confident in my jokes this time round; I improved in my delivery somewhat, if only because I've told those jokes before. Maybe practice really does make perfect. Still not perfect though - one of the comments was that I can afford to be more confident in my jokes. That is certainly an area that I will look to improve in.
I was quite glad receiving the feedback I got, not least because I wasn't really expecting it. But I've got to move on now. Taking on a completely new class with completely new content means I've got to think of completely new jokes.
I'll still be writing my thesis, even though it's beyond my scholarship duration. But that's fine - my school fees are waived, and I'm receiving pay for tutoring for the department; the latter is something I would have aimed for, even if I'd completed my work long ago. In effect then, nothing much has changed.
If you might be wondering why I'm dilly-dallying so much, let me put forth two main reasons here. First, I think I had, at least on some subconscious level, decided I wouldn't go all-out applying for Phd programs this year. Two years of break would be good - that would be time enough to rejuvenate myself, maybe do some creative writing, brush up on my philosophical and scientific knowledge. Thus in some sense, there was no real reason why I needed to rush things out.
Perhaps the more important reason though, is that I'm a person who's not motivated to fill in work that I've already done in my head already. I gleaned this insight from someone I met some months ago, a JC friend. Then, she had looked at me in the eyes and told me (perhaps with a smile too), that she had no doubt, no doubt at all that I would finish my work in time. She said this because she had a fiancé who was working on his Phd thesis but procrastinating himself, and she said that we're just running away from what we knew needed to be done. I was quite taken aback at this actually, in a good way, because it came from someone whom I haven't been in close touch with for years; and yet she said what she said with such earnest confidence, with no hesitation at all.
She's wrong in a way, because I haven't finished my work within my scholarship candidature. But 'in time' doesn't necessarily refer to that. It could just refer to the time that my body acknowledges to be most reasonable to complete in. And since my body had, at least on some subconscious level, decided not to go all-out for Phd application this year, it just means that that time has been further pushed back. At any rate, I think it is indeed true that I feel less excited, or less motivated, to complete projects to the very end. Some people feel motivated to have a polished, finished product on their hands - that makes it easier for them to finish up their work. I don't. I feel motivated thinking through a new project - just thinking through. And once I think I've solved it in my head, or at least once I think I've got a rough outline in place, I start to look for a new project to chew on.
In any case, I'll be looking to finish this as soon as possible, so I can really enjoy taking my classes.
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