The Blue City

How my ECE mentor literally neutralized me today

Lol my ece mentor is a real one.

He literally used my competitiveness against me today.

Austin: you should take a break

Me: no, look at my to-do list

Austin: *peers over to-do list*

Me: See?

Austin: Yeah, I see, but you still need to take break so you don't get sick for the entirety of the semester. You push yourself too hard.

Me: No, I don't, I'm just dedicated. Speaking of which, have you read over my personal statement? (Yes I am aware them's fighting words for those who know about the personal statement debacle)

Austin: *proceeds to check emails*

Me: You know, at the very least he knows who I am (referring to the circuits professor) so that works in my favor, because he knows me. Of course, he vaguely remembers you, but I'm working on changing that because you're an electronics focus. I repeat your name a whole bunch, since I'm trying to look out for you fam.

Austin: By making sure every single professor knows me as well?

Me: *shrugs* I mean, that's the way I do things.

Austin: Well, you may have our circuits professor, but I have my electronics professor.

Me: *gets insanely competitive and can't speak* you—what—

Austin: *smirks at me fumbling over myself*

Me: I can't believe you—you're doing this to make me take a break aren't you?

Austin: Stimulating your hyper-competitiveness to make you chill? I'd do that any day. Go on and think about how you're going to beat me. *goes to read my personal statement*

I'm still laughing internally at this. And I'm still mentally trying to figure out how to beat Austin at Hubbard lmao. But that's just how I am.

Honestly though, Austin is a really, really good mentor. Like he's a really close friend and I go and study with him all the time. I trust his judgement to a fault and I know he always has my best interests at heart.

Like this guy literally has offered to pick up my homework and take notes for me when I'm sick. And he is insanely aggressive about me going and getting better. Every time I cough he's just like "stop dying".

Austin is also one of the reasons I believe in passing down to the future members of the department (but that's an impassioned speech for another time, I have to gush about him for a little bit).

He also said something today that means a lot to me.

He said I was insanely brilliant at ECE (after saying I'm super-energetic, hyper-competitive, and completely forgetful of taking care of myself sometimes) and that my work ethic shows.

I have never considered myself smart. And hearing that from him means a lot. Because I have to work all the time at ECE, so much that I love and hate it all at the same time.

Like being an electrical engineer is so core to my being now that I probably would feel very empty inside without it.

So it means a lot, because I have to be the very best engineer that I can be. Not for running away or fighting my father either, rather, for me. And the fact that someone thinks I'm smart means a lot, because a lot of the time I don't feel smart.

I guess that's part of the learning process though.

Anyways, ya girl is gonna take a nap now because she's running on 3 hours of sleep and is going to have an extremely difficult day tomorrow.

I just wanted to take a moment to really brag on and appreciate someone who is an amazing friend and mentor.

Tschüssi

Blue