Hello there Human! You’re not Dumb, and neither am I.

So I’m a scientist. Sort of.

Well that’s to say I graduated with a Marine Biology Masters. I’ve written long things with fancy sounding names like ‘dissertation’. However, in that world, I still feel like the little child walking around in their mummy’s heels. Like everyone else had a meeting about how to adult that I was never invited to. I struggled. Not because I didn’t work hard, but because I did and still felt like I was faking it.

I worked my butt off writing lab reports and fishery investigations, only to get mediocre results. I found myself questioning whether I was really suited to science. Hating all my super smart science friends for whom it just clicked with. I must be so stupid.

I had to work this hard because although I could read about science til the cows come home, I don’t write like a scientist. I have a very vivid imagination, and I LOVE the elegance of a good story and clever writing. My brain resisted the research formats with all it had.

I couldn’t write boring repetitive pieces of work when my brain wanted to weave osmosis of polychaete worms into the gruesome tale of my worm turning from a happy podgy pink to a gaunt dying grey and a singular spiral of blood curling to the bottom of the beaker of water. If we move past the horrific murder of a worm it was a good story. I would find myself laughing and telling the story to my friends and family of the grey hue starting at the tip of the tail and working its way slowly up the worm, like a disgusting Mexican wave.

Then in my final year, a miracle happened. My Russell group university (Research orientated universities), gave me an assignment that finally clicked. It was called the popular science article. We had to write a summary of our master’s thesis in 500 words so that anyone, with any background, could understand it. And guess what. I got the best result I’d ever received. All those things that people told me were SINS in my scientific work were suddenly things I had that they didn’t. I’d made it fun to read. After all those years I realised I’m not stupid.

Thus I knew I still loved science! But I’m not a scientist. Sort of.

I AM JUST A DIFFERENT KIND OF SMART

Your brain is your brain. It works how it works, and IT WILL work.

Don’t squander it in the wrong place.

You are a clever lil cookie 😉

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