How I got out of a funk

A few weeks ago my perfectionistic tendencies got the better of me. I had been teaching medical students for a few weeks and had recently changed over to my second batch of medkids when I had the misfortune of giving what I felt was a Really Horrible Tutorial. A few factors had come into play that week - the lack of familiarity with the new students, the class size which had doubled due to the first series being well-received, me feeling somewhat blase and uninspired and then perhaps also, the fact that I hadn't prepared at all for the session and thus wasn't in the right frame of mind to give the tutorial. Now don't get me wrong, I had the material for the session - it was the same topic I had taught countless times, I just hadn't gone through it as I normally do and generally felt quite unenthused about the session - I guess after doing it so many times it becomes a little boring. But the coincidence of all those factors meant that from the moment I stepped into the class I wanted to leave. I was terrified, embarassed, bored. I felt like I was wasting my time, and the students time, that it was all a big farce. Then it took me two weeks to get over it. I kid you not. I fretted over this tutorial for weeks. I literally couldn't sleep due to the anxiety. I started to doubt myself - was I a bad teacher, had I not inspired my students that day? Would they turn up the week after? (I don't know why that mattered to me, but it did). In those two weeks I did a fair bit of soul searching, though I didn't get anywhere as I was so paralysed by my sense of failure. I didn't get much else done - no studying, no reading new material, no preparing for the next tutorial. I tried to put off future tutorial sessions. I couldn't bring myself to even face the kids at hospital. I searched high and low for a mentor - someone who could turn things round and make me a good teacher again. Someone who could speak some words of wisdom about how this didn't matter, and where I should go from here. In truth, I found no one. There were some commiserations from colleagues a little further down the path than I. Others who remembered giving bad tutorials themselves. There were reassurances from students I had taught, that the sessions were great and that they had found them useful. There were the miles and miles I ran at the gym to get over my fear or failure. And then one day, I saw it sitting in the corner of a website featuring a Warren Buffet Interview.

"Winning takes talent, to repeat, takes character." John Wooden

For whatever reason that was exactly what I needed to hear. It was my epiphany, the key I needed to get me out of this funk. I resolved at that moment to return to my material. To re-read my work. To find new information, fresh exciting things I could share with the students. I will always be plagued by self-doubt and anxiety but in that moment, that single quote was enough to keep me afloat. I'd given one good series of tutorials this year, and it was time to focus on the second.