A few days ago I found this Instagram post:

“É preciso imaginar Sísifo Feliz” Albert Camus

The phrase about the Sísifo myth is meant to say that, besides the useless nature of the task we have to find happiness in the fight. As the post explains. Well, today I received a rejection from a summer school that was intended to participate. I have low expectations. I am not a brilliant researcher and I am still learning how to work in this publish-or-perish world. Anyway, I prepared myself to submit my application on time. I asked my supervisor for his reference letter, even knowing the topic was not related to our project, and made a plan with my wife to proceed with the care of our daughter - she would need to be alone to care for her during a week and we never got alone for this time.

My heart was broken by the possibility of being far away and giving this hard task to my competition. Even so, I was convinced 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 expectations, 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 don’t manage well short deadlines, I decided to do this with baby steps. This email was from the Project Manager of the Summer School, asking me to submit my application because they had fewer applications and I was inside at that moment. I just need to submit the application for their evaluation. This gave me hope, and this was my mistake.

Before the deadline, I received an email from them telling me they had postponed the deadline for two weeks. I thought this could be a problem for me, but the email says the ones who submit on time would be considered 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.