I like a calm rhythm and to be getting somewhere, or at least getting the chance to do something right. Do you have this in your job? I have had it in some jobs, but this one is like working on an assembly line that is also an obstacle course where, moreover, the ceiling is actually a press that is lowered a little more each day.
Goals seem more and more like ghost ships, something we discuss perceiving and would be glad to even see daily, let alone achieve. People think I have been here a long time but I feel I have just arrived and not gotten my sea legs for it yet. Does anyone else experience what I have just described?
Axé.
coldhearted scientist وداد 
No, it is not within my power because at the moment I am jobless. So, enjoy yours while it lasts.
Yes, I know. This is the thing: something about it has to be made really, really satisfying. Not everything. One thing every day, one thing to be truly pleased with. I am working on it.
Suddenly on my Thanksgiving “break” I am getting so much done: calmly, efficiently, happily, with breaks for a walk, lunch, cooking, feeling I have done enough at the end of the day, all because I don’t feel pressured under the avalanche of tasks. I like to work. I just hate feeling that there is so much to do that I don’t know where to start or what is most important.
I agree with Dame Eleanor and with you. I’m getting more done because I’m not being constantly pulled away by other tasks.
For me it’s not the tasks, it is the attitude of management. I have a 3-3 load, very few graduate students, smallish classes, a service burden within reason, and not terribly high research requirements, so the actual work is not that much of an avalanche.
But each day is so deflating and so much time has to go toward managing the inefficiency and the mystery and the bosses’ emotions, trying to get around the obstacles to getting things done they throw up. I am trying to come up with some sort of self defense program where I can vaccuum seal at least one thing a day, have one thing a day that I get to really do right — something I can feel happy with. I want a hit every day, or to get on base, something like that, not to keep being tagged out or tackled or tripped up every single time.
…and of course, what I am getting at is research. It seems to be the only part of the workday that can be stabilized.