If you love what you are doing, is that not what life is about? I won’t lie to you, there were some truly 100 hour weeks, but for the most part I worked precis

If you love what you are doing, is that not what life is about? I won’t lie to you, there were some truly 100 hour weeks, but for the most part I worked precisely 96 hours per week in the PhD program and I loved it. 6 days of 16 hour days. It was fantastic. I had 3 labs and used parts of 4 others across 4 buildings, ran my main research and several skunkworks side projects, and optimized every moment I could. 3 years of that (with a week here or there for a holiday) I was happy. When we are pursuing something we are passionate about, when we are completely immersed in that thing, it is the greatest tribute to being alive. I either was reading research papers or walking between buildings while eating, I automated some reactions and characterization so that I could read research papers while at the gym, and did numerous other things that made a 3 person project no problem for one person. But to come off that high is hard. Everything seems slower when I’m not in that groove. I get bursts of it, but really being in that flow is such a joyous thing. I hope those working on the module for those crazy hours were doing so because they were passionate about it. If not, then you are right to ask “what kind of life is that?”