Few days ago I found this Instagram post:

“É preciso imaginar Sísifo Feliz” Albert Camus

The phrase about the Sísifo myth is mean to say that, besides the useless nature of the task we have to find happyness in the fight. As the post explains. Well, today I received a rejection from a summer school that was intend to participate. I have low expectatives. I am not a brilliant resarcher and I am still learning how to work on this publish or perish world. Anyway, I prepered myself to submit my application in time. I asked to my supervisor his reference letter, even knowning the topic was not related to our project, and make a plan with my wife to proceed with the cares of our daughter - she would need to be alone to care of her during a week and we never got alone for this time. My heart was broken with the possibility of been far away and give this hard task to my compenion. Even so, I was conviced that it was a great opportunity and, after two hard years of almost full parent dedication, it was time to reconduct my carrier. As I mentioned, I have low expectatives, but I received an email one week before the deadline. I have started my submission and was editing slowly as I had time to do this. Once I make a lot of mistakes and I don’t manage well short deadlines, I decided to do this with baby steps. This email was of the Project Manager of the Summer School, asking me to submit my applycation because they had fewer applications and I was inside at that moment. I just need to submit the application for their evaluation. This give me hope, and this was my mistake. Before the deadline I receive an email of them telling they postpone the deadline for two weeks. I thouth this could be a problem for me, but the email say the ones who submit on time would be consider on the application. Of course they reject me and, even with some relieve about my family situation, I had some dissapoint about this rejection as several others that I have in my academic/researcher life. Then, I have this image of the hapyness of Sísifo and the “publish or perish” world. Of course the Camus discussion was about a more relevant fight. At the end, just accept the eternal flow of rejections is be in conformity with the “publish or perish” paradigm. But, maybe internally, could be your own rock rolling agains the same mountains over and over again. Find joy in the fight, is find joy in the journey, not the outcome. Who could say that Camus could have this couch perspective also.