Original thoughts and multitasking

I would be the first to say I haven't had an original thought in at least two years. Therefore, coming up with a research proposal was particularly difficult because I had to rely on my own ability to generate experiments that no one had thought of before. I would say that the homework that had us look novel research was super helpful in coming up with ideas on my own, because I realized that coming up with your own idea isn't as important as being able to build on someone else's idea.

This project was one of the first times I was allowed to just focus on something that I wanted to. That was wild, because it gave me an insight on how life could be if I was interested in what I did every day.

In terms of the actual presentation, Christy came in super clutch for this. Managing both 20.320 and 20.109 was really tough for me over the past few weeks, because there was so much to do with both. However, the background research she did while I was working on my implementation project was huge.

Finally, giving this presentation was so much easier than giving my journal club presentation. I practiced this one a lot more, and in front of more people, and found that I was much more confident and able to communicate my ideas much more clearly. I don't know if this was a product of being excited about my topic or being more prepared. Only time will tell.

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