By Shilpi Mandal

Attending conferences can evoke a range of emotions. Some people love them, while others may only tolerate or even hate them. These feelings are not mutually exclusive and there is no requirement to feel a certain way. I began my Ph.D. during the pandemic (yep, that one), when in-person conferences in the US were not possible. Despite this, I attended several online conferences. However, the experience soon became monotonous. The physical aspect of conferences was missing - there were no opportunities to meet new people during coffee breaks or form academic and personal friendships.

The most recent conference I attended was, in my opinion, the best one yet! For the first time in three years, I felt physically included in many of the talks. I even met people whose papers I am currently reading and made math friends in my own area for the first time! Being in the same room as all the big shots in my field was something I had never imagined. 

I have read many blog posts and suggestions from the mathematics community about only attending talks that were interesting and not wasting precious research time on talks that do not pique one’s interests at present. To be honest, I agreed with these notions until I attended this conference. I genuinely wanted to be in that room all day, trying to understand what my colleagues were working on.

But it was not all rosy. I had my fair share of negative thoughts - do I even belong here? Will I ever be as good? When will I present my work? Am I not being fast enough? I spent an entire evening sulking, trying to wrap my head around the fact that math research is really as difficult as it feels. But when I woke up the next morning, I reminded myself that I do math because I love it and I proceeded to be amazed by all the brilliance around me. If there’s something I’ve learned from all the wonderful graduate students around me, it’s that we should keep doing what we do best and try to be happy in the process. I was content and am learning to be happy too!

Another important aspect of attending conferences is the opportunity to network and build connections with other researchers. This can be especially valuable for graduate students (like me!) who are just starting their academic careers. By meeting and talking with other researchers in their field, one can learn about new developments and research opportunities, as well as gain insights and advice from more experienced colleagues. Networking can also lead to future collaborations and help build a professional network that can support us throughout our careers. I can't speak for everyone reading this, but for me at least, this whole networking business is a lot of hoops to jump through! 

I am always rattled with thoughts about not belonging in this space, and as expected, it happened at this conference too. And yet, the most wonderful thing also happened - I made friends. They did not know me before the conference but were now making me feel included. There is something to be said about all the people we meet at a conference, how many we remember, and the reasons we remember them. I used to have a knack for remembering people’s faces even if I couldn't remember their names. With the pandemic, that changed (since we never saw anyone anymore, and we were all masking for good!). Now I remember how they made me feel, what math jokes we cracked, which board games we played, where we planned to eat after the long hike and promises and plans about when we can all meet next. Thanks to mathematics, we keep popping up in each other’s radars. This might not be how one conventionally does networking, but I love the wholesomeness of this method.

Academic conferences can elicit a variety of feelings and can sometimes be difficult to navigate. My thoughts on this topic are all over this blog post now (haha!). During these moments of challenging emotions, I often remind myself to have ‘sabr’. It’s an Urdu word that’s difficult to translate, but I’ll try. ‘Sabr’ means having patience and perseverance in the face of adversity. It is the belief that trials and difficulties are opportunities for growth and learning. Such a beautiful thought, isn’t it? A big part of my PhD experience is to develop grit and composure when dealing with uncomfortable feelings, and ‘sabr’ is what keeps me going. I hope we can all practice ‘sabr’ and continue to move forward, even when things get tough.

Shilpi Mandal is a first-gen PhD student at Emory, keeping her passion for math alive. She does a lot of algebra, some geometry and number theory.