You are feeling relief that your coursework is drawing to a close.
You have become somewhat competent at going to class, discussing
materials, and passing tests. However, you have a sense of dread
that keeps creeping up on you every time you try to think of “the
topic” for your dissertation. You look to the senior graduate
students and even ask them questions about how they found their
topic. Divine revelation seems to have hit them and you wonder when
your turn will come. But they seem to be all-knowing, more like
budding faculty now than one of you. So you try to fight the notions
of self-doubt about whether you can actually find a topic and start
the quest of finding someone to help you. You naturally turn to the
professor whom you “know the best.” Is this the right choice? No one
seems to know; you just have this sense that you want to complete
the process as painlessly as possible. As questions swirl inside
your head—from how to choose an advisor to what might be the right
way to pick a dissertation topic—you may ask yourself what the
process of writing your dissertation proposal will really be
like.