I'm four and a half years into my PhD, and I'm finally starting to see the possibility of graduating. I often think that if even a fool like me can earn a PhD, there can't be anyone in the world who can't.

For as long as I can remember, I've thought of myself as someone who is very slow. I worked incredibly hard in high school, yet only managed four points above the admissions cutoff for first-tier universities. The boy who sat next to me was our class monitor. He was smart, outgoing, and good-looking. I envied him. He could spend his time having fun and still get grades I had to give everything I had to reach. Whenever I couldn't figure out a math or physics problem, I would pull hard at my hair. I'm bald now; it actually started back then.

Later, I went to university in northeastern China. Every trip between home and university meant a 38-hour sleeper train journey between Guangzhou and Changchun: through the mountains of the south, across the plains of central China, and finally onto the black earth of the Northeast. Apart from the scenery, what I remember most are the Northeasterners on that train. Every winter break, they would board with their whole families and head south to spend the winter holidays and the New Year in Hainan. Every summer break, Northeasterners living elsewhere would come clattering aboard with bags of local specialties, heading home to escape the summer heat. You could hear a whole carriage of Northeastern aunties chatting and children crying, and smell the Harbin sausage. I never got used to it. I didn't like chatting, and I didn't like Harbin sausage. Yet looking back, this is the Northeast that stays with me most. There isn't much else about those four undergraduate years that stands out in my memory. I never stood out in class, either. I never seemed to be someone who had a plan. I say “seemed” because even I wasn't quite sure what state I was in. You could call it “drifting through life,” but I took whatever I did quite seriously. And yet, if I was serious, how did I end up with a GPA of just 3.27, without even passing all my classes? By comparison, everyone else in my class seemed so driven. Some studied relentlessly to raise their GPAs. Some started preparing three years in advance for postgraduate entrance exams in a different field. Some built connections in the student union to collect the points they needed for postgraduate admission without an entrance exam. Others kept entering competitions and doing research to prepare for studying abroad. Looking back, it wasn't that I didn't want those experiences. I simply “didn't know.” It's like asking a three-year-old what dishes they like to eat. If they've never seen those dishes, how could they know what to choose? For a long time, I lived in that state of “not knowing.” Fortunately, even though I didn't know, I was very willing to try things. While everyone else was studying and working on their GPAs, I started playing around with magic—and somehow kept at it for ten years. While everyone else was finding their own way forward, I stayed with my field, and I'm still in it today. There are regrets, too. I took part in mathematical modeling competitions for all four undergraduate years, going from following someone else's lead to leading a team myself, yet never won even a university-level award. When it came to intelligence, it seemed I was always the fool.

When we finished our undergraduate degrees, four of us, all close friends, agreed to apply to Zhejiang University. I was the only one who didn't make the cutoff: my math score fell short of the university's minimum. I eventually got a place at Southern University of Science and Technology through the graduate admissions transfer process. I remember it was the last round of transfers in May. I received an interview invitation and hurried onto a flight to Shenzhen the next day. Around two in the morning on the night I arrived, I spent two hours walking the streets of Nanshan, unable to find a hotel. Almost all the rooms had been booked by other applicants going through the same process. In the end, I found a rooftop at the university, used my backpack as a pillow and my spare clothes as a blanket, and slept there. Two things amazed me. First, I'd never seen a badminton court on a rooftop before. Second, even with summer almost here, Shenzhen could be pretty cold at night. Looking back, my three years as a master's student were fairly ordinary, but they weren't easy. A senior student in the lab became curious about me because she always saw me alone in a little dark room, doing fluorescence experiments on biological samples. She later became my best friend. She and another senior labmate eventually left their PhD programs and moved back to Changchun, but we still call each other every year to exchange New Year wishes. During the pandemic, I started renting a place off campus because I couldn't stand my roommate's daily schedule. I commuted an hour to work each day. Then I nearly had to delay graduating from my master's because I hadn't published a paper. In the end, the department held a meeting, decided that I had done quite a lot of work, and let me graduate. My first paper didn't come out until the fourth year. My master's advisor had never thought much of my work. On submission day, he asked me to remove the superscript asterisk next to his name.

During my PhD, too, I kept missing deadlines and ended up extending my studies by six months. It seems that every time I give something everything I have, I still can't even reach the passing mark.

I don't think I've ever met anyone as slow as me. Late at night, I often go back over the things I've done. At one point, I even wondered whether I had dyslexia. Whenever I read an exam question, I pore over every word. By the time I've worked out what it's asking, about half the time is already gone. That's why I never manage to finish timed exams. I never finished the math papers in either the college entrance exam or the postgraduate entrance exam. But I haven't dared to get tested. I'm afraid that if I really am this way, there will be nothing I can do to change it. There are things that, if you don't know them, let you keep telling yourself: as long as you're willing to work hard and spend more time, you can succeed at anything.

When it comes to understanding people, I seem to have a kind of “dyslexia,” too. I discovered that what people say can have two meanings: the one on the surface and the one underneath. And the one underneath is what they really mean. For a while, I was so disappointed in people that I became bitter and cynical and wanted nothing to do with anyone. Later, I learned that the people in textbooks aren't the whole picture. In the real world, people are far more complicated than the textbook idea that “human nature is good at birth.” Later still, I realized that, at its root, the problem was my own limited understanding of people. Eight years into research, I still only half understand it. How could I expect to understand people? I think I have a long way to go in that respect.

Ultimately, this is about understanding not only how things work and develop, but also myself. Confucius said, “Acknowledge what you know, and acknowledge what you don't.” I thought I knew, then eventually found out I didn't. I believed I knew, and went a long way down the road of believing I knew, only to realize that I didn't. Then I went a little further and seemed to know a little after all. I think this is the stage I'm at now.

Looking back on my PhD years, most of what I feel is gratitude and a need to say sorry. I'm grateful to my advisor for giving me a place where I could freely explore things I didn't yet know. I wish I'd had more results to show for it. But in terms of satisfying my curiosity and growing as a person, I feel deeply fulfilled. I'm sorry for the trouble I caused friends along the way through my immaturity and my poor understanding of people. If I get the chance, I'd like to apologize to each of them in person. When life is going well, it's easy to overlook other people's feelings. When things go badly, feelings of inadequacy can make us terribly rude. I remind myself of these lessons all the time.

I'm full of hope for the future. I'm beginning to see myself more clearly, and I have a better idea of the life I want. I hope we can encourage one another along the way.