A few weeks ago, I successfully turned in another chapter to my advisor. I thought for sure that would give me the momentum and confidence I need to plow through the next chapter, the next and the one after that. Sadly, my perceived ambition does not get along well with my actual ability to motivate myself.
Motivation to complete my dissertation is NOT the problem. There's a laundry list of things, personal and professional, that motivate me to complete my dissertation in the shortest amount of time possible. So, why can't I just sit down and pound on my keyboard for 10 hours and bang out some inspired work?
I have no idea.
If anyone has an answer, I'm open to it.
I do however think that no matter the motivation behind finishing, the amount of time you have to do your work, and then the pressure that mounts with each passing moment, there is just one thing holding me back - me. It's an odd feeling. How is it that I, the one with all the power, all the motivation, all the reason in the world to keep moving forward - how is it that I am still stuck?
Enough blogging, back to writing. Chapter 8, you'll be mine before the new year (or so I hope!)
Wednesday, December 29, 2010
Thursday, November 11, 2010
"Graduate Students are the Worst"
A friend of mine from my PhD program had this posted to Facebook today - love it!
(originally from an article on the Huffington Post)
ahem, and if anyone can figure out how to make this embedded video not so huge, I'm open for suggestions :)
Yeah, we really are the worst!
(originally from an article on the Huffington Post)
ahem, and if anyone can figure out how to make this embedded video not so huge, I'm open for suggestions :)
Yeah, we really are the worst!
Going Organic
I finally finished chapter 7 of 10 chapters! What a feat! It felt so good and I hit the town with some friends and had myself a fabulous dinner. Then the next morning waking up from my Alaskan King Crab Legs and Raspberry Mojito hangover I started to edit. In the editing I noticed something. Chapter 7 just isn't working...
Realizing something I have poured your heart into isn't quite right is so hard to confess to myself. Fortunately (or unfortunately - depends on how you look at it), I've been here before. I've been at this point where I'm jubilant, proud of my progress only to be knocked down a peg or two by reality (pun intended).
Make no mistake, my dissertation will not be the next Iliad, or some other epic tome. My dissertation will be compete, it will be thoughtful and it will be mine. In order to accomplish those things a girl's got to have standards!
So, this past Sunday instead of melting down (the typical response when reality knocks me off my proverbial horse) I got back on and started to figure out what was so out of whack. To save you the boring stream of consciousness, the structure was all wrong. I wasn't taking care of answering the biggest questions using the structure I had in place. I was organizing my results all wrong.
The great news is, nothing is lost. No time is lost, no effort is lost. It is all part of this living organism. It might sound dangerously simple, but the hardest lesson to learn while writing your dissertation is that it is not static. It is not stuck in time or in an outline or even in a paradigm. The way I move from chapter to chapter seems to be redefined in more ways than I would have expected.
This is a tough realization because I am a planner. I like to know when I'm doing something, how it will get done and how long until I am finished. It's an obsession (as evidenced by the numerous time lines, schedules and dissertation calendars I've amassed in the last year).
So, today, I say with confidence that the dissertation is an organic being. It breaths, it changes forms and most importantly it has an essence (aka the thesis/research problem). When I divert from the center it shows. As it did so plainly in chapter 7. I would love to control exactly how much longer it will take to write this darned thing. But I can't. The best I can do is push through and try to enjoy the process as much as possible.
On that note - back to salvaging what I've written to fit into my new outline so I can stay on top of my new schedule - D'OH!! I'll never learn!
Happy Veteran's day!
Oh and back to my Bridget Jone Diary documentation:
Today: 0 hours on the D (Hoping to get at least 2 hours in tonight!)
Tomorrow: Hoping for 2.5 hours!
Realizing something I have poured your heart into isn't quite right is so hard to confess to myself. Fortunately (or unfortunately - depends on how you look at it), I've been here before. I've been at this point where I'm jubilant, proud of my progress only to be knocked down a peg or two by reality (pun intended).
Make no mistake, my dissertation will not be the next Iliad, or some other epic tome. My dissertation will be compete, it will be thoughtful and it will be mine. In order to accomplish those things a girl's got to have standards!
So, this past Sunday instead of melting down (the typical response when reality knocks me off my proverbial horse) I got back on and started to figure out what was so out of whack. To save you the boring stream of consciousness, the structure was all wrong. I wasn't taking care of answering the biggest questions using the structure I had in place. I was organizing my results all wrong.
The great news is, nothing is lost. No time is lost, no effort is lost. It is all part of this living organism. It might sound dangerously simple, but the hardest lesson to learn while writing your dissertation is that it is not static. It is not stuck in time or in an outline or even in a paradigm. The way I move from chapter to chapter seems to be redefined in more ways than I would have expected.
This is a tough realization because I am a planner. I like to know when I'm doing something, how it will get done and how long until I am finished. It's an obsession (as evidenced by the numerous time lines, schedules and dissertation calendars I've amassed in the last year).
So, today, I say with confidence that the dissertation is an organic being. It breaths, it changes forms and most importantly it has an essence (aka the thesis/research problem). When I divert from the center it shows. As it did so plainly in chapter 7. I would love to control exactly how much longer it will take to write this darned thing. But I can't. The best I can do is push through and try to enjoy the process as much as possible.
On that note - back to salvaging what I've written to fit into my new outline so I can stay on top of my new schedule - D'OH!! I'll never learn!
Happy Veteran's day!
Oh and back to my Bridget Jone Diary documentation:
Today: 0 hours on the D (Hoping to get at least 2 hours in tonight!)
Tomorrow: Hoping for 2.5 hours!
Tuesday, October 26, 2010
"When pressure exceeds your perceived ability to cope"
"When pressure exceeds your perceived ability to cope" - (Palmer & Cooper, 2010, p. 7)
The above quote is the definition of stress. It's like a light bulb went off in my head when I read these words. How in all of my schooling, and all my classes with psych PhD's had I never heard this? It's a brilliant concise way to describe stress and it's the reason I bought the book:
I haven't finished it yet, but I'm trying to get through the book so I can deal with my stress better. At this point it bottles up inside and I erupt like a crazy person. I owe it to myself, my husband and friends to get a grip, so I'm reading my first "self-help" book. It's by a couple of PhD's so I feel a little better about it.
The best part of it though is the concept of control. Once I read that definition of stress I understood: I can cope with this dissertation... it will be mine, oh yes, it will.
So, as I continue to chart these rough waters (I love a water pun!), I'm happy to say that I'm getting closer to finishing my looming, anxiety-inducing chapter 7. This is the first of my results chapters - there are three total. There's a lot left to do, but I'm coping.
Saturday, October 2, 2010
It's been a long time...
It's been an embarrassingly long LONG time since I worked on my dissertation and subsequently added to this little blog.
In the meantime, I got married, went on a fabulous honeymoon, started a new job with Nielsen doing research at a international CPG company, and moved to CT. (Not necessarily in that order!). Needless to say a lot has changed, but happily, the dissertation topic has not!
At the moment, I am procrastinating. I'm hitting a bit of a wall because, frankly, it has been ages since I have had to write intelligently and I am finding it intimidating. Some of what I wrote before April is really very good. I feel like what I write now is monosyllabic and uninspired. I'm frustrated because I worked so hard in graduate school to have style in my writing and now, out of practice, I feel I've lost it. I'm hoping it's something I can get back into, but for now, I need to plow through and not let it keep me paralyzed.
My husband (still so fun to say that!) is amazing. He keeps me focused and even gives me a little tough love when I start making excuses for lack of progress. I think this might be a way to keep me on task and on point since I never want to let him down. I have made a new timeline, shared it with my advisor and am trying like hell to keep to it. More on that later!
Thankfully, I have a partner in crime. A good friend of mine from my PhD program is in the same boat - same job, same point in the dissertation, same big move away from normalcy, and same desire to GET IT DONE.
So, inspiration of the day to keep me pushing along: if I complete my goal, I have a fabulous date night ahead!
Music inspiring today's outlook on the D:
Aaliyah feat. Timbaland - Try Again
In the meantime, I got married, went on a fabulous honeymoon, started a new job with Nielsen doing research at a international CPG company, and moved to CT. (Not necessarily in that order!). Needless to say a lot has changed, but happily, the dissertation topic has not!
At the moment, I am procrastinating. I'm hitting a bit of a wall because, frankly, it has been ages since I have had to write intelligently and I am finding it intimidating. Some of what I wrote before April is really very good. I feel like what I write now is monosyllabic and uninspired. I'm frustrated because I worked so hard in graduate school to have style in my writing and now, out of practice, I feel I've lost it. I'm hoping it's something I can get back into, but for now, I need to plow through and not let it keep me paralyzed.
My husband (still so fun to say that!) is amazing. He keeps me focused and even gives me a little tough love when I start making excuses for lack of progress. I think this might be a way to keep me on task and on point since I never want to let him down. I have made a new timeline, shared it with my advisor and am trying like hell to keep to it. More on that later!
Thankfully, I have a partner in crime. A good friend of mine from my PhD program is in the same boat - same job, same point in the dissertation, same big move away from normalcy, and same desire to GET IT DONE.
So, inspiration of the day to keep me pushing along: if I complete my goal, I have a fabulous date night ahead!
Music inspiring today's outlook on the D:
Aaliyah feat. Timbaland - Try Again
Monday, February 1, 2010
It's a good sign!
It's been quite a while since I've last posted anything on my "productive, keeping promises, and living up to goals" blog. That is, after all, why I started this blog - to hold myself accountable. Turns out what I needed was some real motivation. I had a lovely Christmas and went to London with my fiancé. When I returned to an unfinished dissertation proposal I thought, ok, enough is enough! I get married in 5 months and this thing MUST be out of my life!
After making that decision there was some drama about methodology, major editing and revisions and even some second-guessing about life plans, but all things told, my proposal is complete and approved! So, maybe it was a good thing for me to not post every sordid detail of the process. Let's be honest, the monotony of my whining, worry and stress gets even my fiancé (the most tolerant in the world of my mood swings) a little irritated!
The next step has begun and I am officially a data collecting machine. I view episodes of Survivor, take my notes and watch them again. Take some more notes and watch it again. Basically until I know them by heart ;). So, I decided to use this blog again to track my progress. Today's goal is to complete 3 episodes. Here's hoping! I've got lots more to do, but staying on schedule is most important. My defense date looms - April 26th.
Hopefully tomorrow will report great progress and an accomplished goal. This week promises to be a very productive one. And at the end I'm rewarded with a mini-family get together, so I've got to earn it!
After making that decision there was some drama about methodology, major editing and revisions and even some second-guessing about life plans, but all things told, my proposal is complete and approved! So, maybe it was a good thing for me to not post every sordid detail of the process. Let's be honest, the monotony of my whining, worry and stress gets even my fiancé (the most tolerant in the world of my mood swings) a little irritated!
The next step has begun and I am officially a data collecting machine. I view episodes of Survivor, take my notes and watch them again. Take some more notes and watch it again. Basically until I know them by heart ;). So, I decided to use this blog again to track my progress. Today's goal is to complete 3 episodes. Here's hoping! I've got lots more to do, but staying on schedule is most important. My defense date looms - April 26th.
Hopefully tomorrow will report great progress and an accomplished goal. This week promises to be a very productive one. And at the end I'm rewarded with a mini-family get together, so I've got to earn it!
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