Fear of failure - I've wrestled with it below the surface before, but now I'm rather tired of it, and wish I could conquer it rather than having it buoy upwards for others to witness and make witty dinner conversation on. I wonder what I'll decide to do - I can see that declining will make me wonder whether I've let another gift go by unopened, but it doesn't help ease my worries. I don't even know myself whether my reluctance to accept is due to some antiquated (and potentially incorrect, from a purely logical point of view, if such things are possible) ethical standards, or whether it is me trying to stem yet more change. Maybe I can read this post much later and laugh at how I was worried about nothing. Or maybe I'll feel sorry at an opportunity lost! "The question", I hear someone important saying, "is whether this is merely a lack of self-belief or an astute yet harsh pragmatism". I feel as though I should say to whichever unfortunate soul has to size me up, "Look fellas, I fear you're confusing work ethic with ability; I don't want you to accept me with false hopes that I will never live up to". I just don't want to get caught in the situation where I'm surrounded by genuinely intelligent people who are brought down by my ineptitute; my brilliant analysis of a greedy algorithm in last year's algorithms exam isn't going to help me much in a crunch situation!

People have already voiced gentle dissent, but I suppose most (somewhat rightly) assume this is a diversion to hide my real fear of having to make a moderate change, albeit for a short while. Of course, I am jumping the gun a bit, because nothing has been signed, nor do I have any reason to suspect that I will be picked. If I don't, think is nonetheless an interesting gedanken I may as well participate in.

Edit: It's kind of surreal to read back on things like this. Not that I was wrong or changed my view; nossir, I went through the whole process thinking the same thing at every passing moment (and I made sure everyone knew this). And yet somehow, it is over and done with now, just another "achievement" under my belt. In the event that I promote the whole thing to people in future years, it's somehow unfair that like-minded people won't realize the true paranoia that lurked underneath, and thus realize that you can pull through. You might think you don't deserve the opportunity and all that, but no-one else seems to think that. Even if you feel you haven't done anything (because it doesn't seem like anyone notices!). I suppose life goes on.