We find we have predictable periods of “now what”, with the podcast, Meteor, as well as in our own, separate professional endeavors. And we’re trying to embrace these cycles as one of the indicators that we are in an advanced stage of our scicomm careers.

The symptoms of our identity crises depend on our circumstances, like:

• the cadence of our evaluation cycles (say, annual reports for a grant or a supervisor)
• our workload (sometimes all freelance clients want everything at the same time!)

and may display in recognizable ways, like an itch to update our websites, change our profile pics everywhere, or overhaul our bios.

While we used to anchor ourselves first by asking whether we were doing the things that meet (external) expectations, now we’re asking: how does this work serve our communities or this stage in our careers?

Then, we ask you to dig in for yourself: What are you trying to decide in your scicomm life right now, and what sort of reflection questions do you use to navigate that decision?

Thanks for listening! We’re hoping for a community potluck 🥗🍛: Connect with us on social media (BlueSky, LinkedIn, Twitter, various Slack communities, etc.) or at www.meteorscicomm.org.

P.S. If you missed it, we’re going to try something new next season — guests!!! Deets here if you want to join. And, if anyone listening reading has funding to help us compensate guests, please let us know!