I started writing a blog post about different fields of study and jobs that I've tried or thought about and how none of them has worked out. I realized that much of my introductory material is essentially the same as this post, which I wrote 16 months ago. There are, of course, some differences in what I would emphasize or how I'd phrase things, but it's mostly the same.
The bottom line is that I'm still not really into my research. I suppose it might be a little different if I were in another job. If I were on an assembly line, I could do good work even though I didn't think much of it. But as a researcher, I can't do high-quality work without being fully invested in it. So far, I haven't been fully invested and it's crippled my ability to perform.
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