I am a research mathematician. I work hard, but I also spend a lot of time pursuing other interests such as yoga, swing dancing, and improv comedy. This takes away from the time I do math.
Does this make me less of a mathematician? Of course it does. This is a tautology. I am a mathematician to the extent which I devote my time and energy to learning and doing math.
Sometimes I feel guilty about this, but on reflection, this is a sacrifice I am willing to make. We only get one shot at life, and we have to balance all of the activities we find valuable.
Totally agree. And I believe those other interests may make you more valuable in some other context (such as a business owner, people manager, parent or spouse, etc).
I once heard the terms "T Person" and "I Person" as ways to represent a person's skills (though I don't find any info on it with any Google searches; maybe I'll write about it someday).
An I Person is someone whose skills are very narrow (vertical). This person is a specialist and probably spends the majority of his/her time perfecting that skill.
A T Person is someone who also has a predominant skill, but it's perhaps not as deep as an I Person. However, a T Person has a horizontal bar that stretches across a range of skills.
I don't recall hearing about a "- (Dash) Person", but if I were to continue this analogy, that would be a jack of all trades, master of none.
Society needs all types of people, but I suspect T People are especially desirable in a startup. You want a person who can do a little of everything, but excels in one particular area.
>Does this make me less of a mathematician? Of course it does.
I disagree. Burn out is a real thing and once it happens your capacity is drastically reduced. I suspect you've probably found the maximum output you're capable of producing long term.
It's possible you're right. In my case I rather doubt it -- especially considering the late nights I've been out -- but at the very least I agree that this kind of thing is often true.
Does this make me less of a mathematician? Of course it does. This is a tautology. I am a mathematician to the extent which I devote my time and energy to learning and doing math.
Sometimes I feel guilty about this, but on reflection, this is a sacrifice I am willing to make. We only get one shot at life, and we have to balance all of the activities we find valuable.