Perspectives
"Success is stumbling from failure to failure with no loss of enthusiasm” – Winston Churchill
How a Doctoral student demonstrates resilience in overcoming depression as well as being separated from his wife and children due to the Covid19 pandemic, and successfully graduates.
Written by Dr. Christopher Toh
Though we may not always realize it, life’s limitations can sometimes inspire us to strive for heights we may not have reached otherwise. And it’s an important lesson for everyone who are navigating the sometimes-difficult journey of learning. Because, the truth is, some of the most successful people in the world have overcome tremendous obstacles in order to reach their goals eventually.
The coronavirus pandemic that broke out in 2019 globally had disrupted my life as an investment and financial analyst . When Covid19 broke, I was then enrolled as a DBA student with the SUSS’s School of Business, studying for a Doctor in Business Administration (DBA) course, while my Chinese wife and 4-year-old daughter lived in China.
Back then, at age 51, I found that situational circumstances that were beyond my control were the contributing factors that led to my depression. For one reason, Covid19 was a global pandemic. At the same time, my wife who is a People’s Republic of China (PRC) citizen and whose passport validity had expired, could not successfully renew the expired passport, as the PRC authorities had closed the Chinese borders to the rest of the world. The whole world had gone into a lockdown mode with travel restrictions put in place and air travel grinded to a total halt. During the COVID-19 pandemic, many countries and territories imposed quarantines, entry bans, or other travel restrictions for citizens or recent travelers to the most affected areas. Some countries and territories imposed global restrictions that apply to all foreigners, or prevented their own citizens from travelling overseas. These uncontrollable external circumstances meant that I could not travel to China and could not take my daughter back to Singapore to attend primary school back then. My family of three had to live in separate places from the start of Covid19 till 2022. I missed my wife and daughter so much and subsequently suffered from depression. The nights turned to many sleepless hours and hope seemed like a far-fetched ideology at that time.
In addition to the fact of having to live separately from my wife and daughter, the pandemic also disrupted everything else for me. Covid19 also severely impacted my ability to continue writing my doctoral thesis which was to study the sustainability of China’s coal industry. As a doctoral student at SUSS, I had originally planned to write up my doctoral dissertation between 2020 and 2021, while at the same time traveling back and forth between Singapore and China to collect all the required information and conduct face-to-face interviews with the local coal industry practitioners who reside in China. However, with the travel restrictions, entry bans as well as health quarantines put in place to reduce the spread of the coronavirus, I was grounded and worried that I would be unable to collect enough data to complete the paper. I was under a lot of pressure, and with the mounting pressure, I even thought about giving up the doctoral course at that point of time altogether.
Fortunately with the encouragement of my family and with the help of a psychiatrist and health professionals I managed to gradually get rid of my negative emotions. I persisted in completing my doctoral studies and also worked hard to overcome the challenges of writing the doctoral thesis, made possible from the data obtained from interviewing all of the Chinese Coal practitioners via an online platform. I earned my doctorate in business administration within three years and finally graduated successfully in October 2022. It was a tremendous relief and an achievement that I am proud of. During an interview by Media Corp’s 8 World news agency, I shared that I returned to school because I wanted to learn and acquire new knowledge. To me, life will never be a bed of roses and can’t be smooth sailing all the time. But no matter how many setbacks you encounter, you can’t let yourself be defeated. You must always remain steadfast and committed to your resilience in the face of all the curveballs life throws at you. The most important thing is to believe in yourself and move forward courageously, and you will achieve something.
I hope that my story will encourage any alumni who face challenges to press on and take it one step at a time. Don’t give up. You will get there!
