Welcome to the Significant Impact podcast, the show dedicated to helping women faculty convert their NIH Career Development Award into their first big R01. This period in your career is such an important turning point and it's a crucial opportunity to design the kind of research career that really works for you so that you're able to write and lead these big, career-fueling research project grants. It's not easy to figure out what you really want when you have so many different voices in your ear telling you what to do and how to do it. But it is possible to design a career that's fulfilling and meaningful to you while also securing enough grant funding to sustain your lab and make an impact with your research. That's what we're talking about here on Significant Impact, with me, sarah Dobson, nih grant consultant and academic career coach. Tune in for an honest look at what it really takes to be successful in the world of NIH grant funding. Start thinking differently about what an academic career looks like, one that's driven by purpose and curiosity and a healthy dose of disruptive energy. So I don't need to remind you how difficult the last few months have been in higher education and biomedical research. It has been scary, it has been frustrating, it has been heartbreaking, and I've had a lot of conversations over the last few months with early career researchers who are facing some really big challenges, and so today I wanted to talk about some of the insights that emerge from that conversation and whether you are currently facing something similar, or if you have managed to navigate this period relatively unscathed. What I recognize in these insights is that these are the things that we have been talking about all along on this show in terms of how to navigate your career. Those things, even in the extreme scenarios that we find ourselves in now, those principles haven't really changed that much, and so I wanted to talk through some of that with you today and help us all remember what we need to stay focused on to navigate uncertainty and to navigate challenges.

So a lot of the conversations that I have been having lately have been with PIs who have had their grants terminated through no fault of their own, just the rug pulled out from underneath them, and they are trying to figure out what comes next. And they are trying to figure out what comes next, and, of course, it is completely understandable that in that scenario there would be quite a lot of panic right. Something that you had planned for and foreseen and organized around is no longer available. And so what do you do? A lot of the PIs that I have spoken to in this situation are scrambling a bit. They are trying to get themselves onto other people's grant applications. They are seeking out new funding opportunities. They are doing truly whatever they can to salvage the work that they have been doing or cobble together some sort of plan to, you know, pay their salary and continue to pay the others on their team. Right, that's an understandable reaction to the current circumstances.

But in those conversations, what I have observed and what I have coached a few of these early career researchers around, is this idea that you don't have any agency in this anymore, that the circumstances have have totally taken over and you just need to do whatever you can to fix it. And what that typically looks like is spreading yourself really thin. Right, you are doing whatever you can to cobble things together and you are reaching out and tapping your network and getting yourself on grants and you are spreading, spreading, spreading. But what can end up happening in that situation is that you don't have any room left for your own work. You don't have any room left for your own work, right, if you are putting yourself on other people's grants to try to stay afloat, then that may mean that you don't have any room left for your own work, and what I really want to drive home here is the idea that if you don't think you have any agency, you just give it away for free, right? If you don't think that you have any say, in the situation that you don't get to make any choices, you don't get to prioritize your own work, then you are not going to do it. The beliefs that you have about your position in this situation dictate the choices that you think are available to you, and again because of that, you can end up putting yourself in a situation where it is extremely difficult for you to get back on track and do the work that you were previously doing before the grant termination, because there's just no room for it. And so I caution you to, not only because you need to hold on to that meaning and that fulfillment and that sense of ownership over your research ideas, but because that have brought you here are completely out of your control. But that does not mean that you can't still retain some control over what happens next.

The other thing that I wanted to bring into today's conversation is what happens to us emotionally in these types of scenarios. Right, you are thrust into a situation again through no fault of your own and the immediate and understandable reaction is to start to try to fix it. And you know we've just talked about the consequences of just trying to fix it as quickly as you can and how that might erode your own work and your own sense of agency over your own work. But the part that I want to talk about now is that urgency to fix the situation and what that allows you to skip over. And what it allows you to skip over is how you feel about it.

The people that I've talked to over the last few months have said something along the lines of I know what I need to do and I sit down at my desk and I just do not have the energy or I can't focus or I just can't get it together to write this thing or take this next step. And my first question is always have you grieved this situation? And they kind of look at me like a deer in headlights, like what do you mean? And again, it is completely understandable that you follow that urgency to solve the problem and fix things. But it is really important to take some time to grieve, to have a tantrum, to throw yourself a pity party, because those feelings exist and they are not going to go away by responding to the urgency and, like we just talked about, responding to the urgency in the context of all of those feelings that you're trying to suppress might lead you to make some short-term decisions that really affect you long term, and so my advice is always to just take some time to acknowledge and honor how hard this is emotionally.

You are allowed to feel those things. Not only are you allowed to feel them. It's really important that you make room for those feelings. Let yourself acknowledge the unfairness of the situation so that you can be honest with yourself about what it really feels like to have to do this, because it does not serve you to pretend like you don't feel that way, and that doesn't mean that you have to do it in public. It just means that you need to carve out some space to feel your feelings and I'm serious, throw yourself a pity party, have a tantrum, just take some time to let those feelings move through you, and you might be thinking well if I let those feelings out've been in conversation with over the last few months.

What I have told them is that most feelings are just like the weather they come through and they pass. What makes a feeling so big is resisting it, saying I should not feel this way, I don't deserve to feel bad about this or I don't want to feel like this. Pushing the feeling away, resisting it is what makes it bigger. But if you just give yourself some space to let that feeling pass, you will find that it does in fact pass and you feel much better, much lighter, and you can actually continue with what you were hoping to do and regain that focus. Not that you need to think about this as a way to regain your focus, but I want you to consider if you are struggling to focus, it may be in part because you have not allowed yourself the opportunity to acknowledge everything that you are feeling. And so, again, giving yourself the time and space to feel what you need to feel will allow those feelings to move through. I know it can feel scary to open that door, but I promise you, if you welcome those feelings, if you acknowledge them, if you let them out, they will not consume you in the way that you are afraid of. And, of course, I want to add the caveat here that if you are experiencing real mental distress severe anxiety, depression that is something that requires professional support. That's not what I'm talking about here. I'm talking about the understandable emotional reaction that you might be having to the circumstances that you find yourself in. These topics are ones that we have been talking about since day one of this show.

Right Is making intentional decisions, not panic-based decisions, and acknowledging your own humanity in your research career. Right. Obviously, the circumstances in the last six months have been extraordinary and extraordinarily difficult, but again, those principles are the same and the actions that you take are the same, which is to stay true to your vision for your career and do as much as you can to retain a focus on your own work and on the impact that you want to have. You want to avoid spreading yourself too thin so that you're not able to pursue the work that you are best suited to do, that is most meaningful and fulfilling to you and will allow you to create the impact that you want to create. And, likewise, checking in with yourself and being in dialogue with your own emotions and understanding when you need to pause and acknowledge those feelings and make space for them, to remind yourself that it is understandable to feel the way that you're feeling and to allow yourself to have a human response to an extraordinary situation. If you are struggling, if you are having a really tough time, if you are finding it difficult to focus, I urge you to check in with yourself, to make room to feel sad and frustrated and heartbroken and angry and actually carve out time and space for that. It's really important. All right, my friends, that is it for this week. I will see you next time.

Thanks for listening to this episode of Significant Impact from K Award to your first big R01. If you want to dig deeper into what we learned today and move a significant step closer to a smooth K-R transition, visit sarahdobsonco slash pod and check out all the free stuff we have to help you do just that. Don't forget to subscribe to the show to make sure you hear new episodes as soon as they're released. And if today's episode made you think of a colleague or a friend, please tell them about it. Tune in next time and thanks again for listening.