Your last rejection is taking up more space in your brain than your last success

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Click here to get your free AI Hacks For Academics Guide 〰️

Academia trains you to remember the failures:

📄 The rejected paper.

💸 The grant you didn’t get.

📝 The reviewer who thought your entire life’s work was “unclear.”

What we don’t do is keep track of the wins. Which means your brain quietly convinces you that you’re always behind, never doing enough.

That’s why I keep a wins spreadsheet. Nothing fancy — just a running list of things I’m happy about and have achieve, in Excel. Paper submitted. Student emailed to say thanks for helping them. Even the small stuff, like finally fixing a piece of admin that’s been haunting me.

It takes 5 seconds to update, and it completely changes how you see your week. Instead of ending Friday in a fog of “I should have done more,” you can actually see the progress.

And an added benefit, when it’s time for promotion, grants, or appraisals, you already have a record. You’re not racking your brain trying to remember what you achieved during the past year.

But this is more than just your to-do list or list of accomplishments. It builds belief. It gives your brain evidence that you are moving forward. Rewires your thought processes to know you do belong here and you can do it (and that’s the real antidote to imposter syndrome – believing you belong).

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