academic coach

Fight Your Fears

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“I realize that if I wait until I am no longer afraid to act, write, speak, be, I’ll be sending messages on a Ouija board, cryptic complaints from the other side.”

- Audre Lorde

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Fear is often what keeps us from moving forward.

Whether writing the dissertation, or writing for publication, the fear of exposure is often what keeps us blocked.

We are afraid of exposing our ideas to an audience.

• “What if I’m wrong?”
• “What if I look stupid?”
• “What if my advisor doesn’t like it?”
• “What if it gets rejected?”
• “What if someone else has already said it?”
• “What if I’ve made mistakes?”
• “What if people criticize my work?”
• “What if it’s poorly written?”
• “What if my ideas are mediocre?”
• “What if my findings can’t be replicated?”
• “What if my peers are jealous?”
• “What if people attack my theory?”
• “What if it could be much better?”
• “What if I can’t think of another project?”
• “What if it’s worse than I think?”
• “What if I succeed?”
• “What if I fail?”

The possible fears are infinite.

However, most of our anxieties are based on a few basic tenets.  Among the basic themes are fear of external judgments and fear of facing our own limitations.

To move forward, we must let go of our wish for approval. We must give up our need for control. We must accept that we are imperfect.

This week, face your internal specters and expose your work to the world.

The courage to move forward in spite of fear is the mark of a successful academic.

Which fears will you face this week?

Keep Track - The Benefits of Self-Monitoring

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“You can observe a lot just by watching.”

Yogi Berra

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When you want to make a change, do you keep track of your actions? You should.

Psychologists call the act of recording a chosen behavior “self-monitoring” and research shows that it is a useful technique when you are trying to create new habits or break bad habits.

There are many advantages of keeping track of your efforts in a systematic way and it is well worth spending time to devise self-monitoring methods that work for you.

Why is self-monitoring useful?

· First of all, self-monitoring helps to create structure. Our academic progress becomes more concrete when observed by visible, external measures.

· A second benefit is that the mere act of recording behaviors changes the occurrence of the behavior in the desired direction. For example, studies of people trying to quit smoking show that keeping track of each cigarette smoked decreased the total number.

· Finally, self-monitoring systems form the basis for active programs to change behaviors because your measure of progress can form the basis for programs of reward or punishment. A new CD for five days of hourly writing, for example.

Methods of monitoring yourself vary as much as the events or behaviors you choose to measure. Techniques range from completely free-form records, such as a personal journal that you write in whenever you wish, to extremely structured measurements, such as graphs and charts indicating the cumulative time you spend on your dissertation or writing journal articles.

Many of us already have self-monitoring systems in place but could benefit from deciding to add further means of keeping track of progress.

Here are some types of self-monitoring:

• A personal journal
• A monthly, weekly, or daily calendar and planner
• Work plans and project outlines
• Time management diaries
• A timeline of deadlines for sections of written work
• “To Do” lists
• Daily charts of time spent or work produced
• Cumulative graphs of time spent or work produced

Here are some of the behaviors or events monitored:

• Subjective thoughts and feelings
• Time spent working on academic writing
• Pages written or revised
• Appointments made with mentors or colleagues
• Articles read
• Subjects interviewed
• Statistical problems solved
• Experiments conducted
• Time spent exercising, meditating or relaxing

Paying attention to the way you set up self-monitoring records is important. Here are some tips for creating a system that you will be motivated to use on a consistent basis:

·Think Visual: make your system clear, understandable and graphically interesting.
·Be Playful: try using lots of colors and creativity. Bright pens, attractive notebooks, and even fun stickers can make the system more lighthearted.
·Keep It In Your Face: Display charts and graphs prominently so that you’ll be reminded frequently of your efforts.

Be sure to reward yourself, both mentally with self-praise, and externally with small treats, for keeping your chart, graph or journal. Establishing a system for measuring your progress and output will help you succeed as an academic over time.

What self-monitoring systems do you already use?
What new technique will you begin using this week?

power point power point power

Death by power point is still prevelent, if not rampant in academia.

A well-known and still important example:

The Gettysburg Address rendered in power point.  The brilliant illustration of death by power point created by Peter "Google Guy" Norvig.  Lincoln ruined.

And what about this brilliant cartoon by the brilliant marketing maven Hugh McLeod?

  See more of his funnies at his blog. 

You've been there, right?

Computer Dies to Save World from Horrid Thesis

A friend sent me a funny article from The Onion:

"Heroic Computer Dies to Save World From Master's Thesis"

The gist of the story is that a brave little IBM Thinkpad destroyed itself to protect us from the thesis of a Brandeis University English graduate student.  The title of the thesis?

A Hermeneutical Exploration Of Onomatopoeia In The Works Of William Carlos Williams As It May Or May Not Relate To Post-Agrarian Appalachia.

The student's professor is grateful.  He says:

"It was an incredible act of bravery. This laptop sacrificed itself in order to put an end to (the student's) senseless rambling."

Added the professor: "I only wish some of my other students' computers could be as selfless and brave as this one."

Focus Pocus

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“The ability to focus attention on important things is a
defining characteristic of intelligence.”

                       -  Robert J. Shiller, Irrational Exuberance

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Do you start every day by working on your most important project?

This is an essential habit of the most productive people I know.

Many of us start with a warm-up period that sometimes morphs into time-wasting.  We check our email, peruse the news, read a few favorite blogs and, before we know it, the hour we planned to use writing has meandered into procrastination.

Consistent focus on our priorities is the way to make significant progress on our work (and in other areas of our life as well). 

This is why the vast majority of novelists and other professional writers begin each day by writing for a set period of time.  What would happen if you began each weekday morning with an hour of focused attention on your research and writing?  The cumulative result would be many publications, or a finished dissertation, I’ll wager.

Maintaining focus – on both a macro and micro level – is one of my greatest personal challenges.  I’m the type of person who opens my email program with the intention of sending an important message, gets distracted with new notes in my in-box, answers a few requests, , and then logs off having forgotten to write the message I had logged on to send.  Does this ever happen to you?

My most productive days are those when I first review and update my “to do” list, plan which steps I’ll take and when, avoid unimportant detours, and keep my priorities in focus.  It always surprises me how much I can accomplish when I apply my energy to my chosen task.

Do you need to focus your attention more consciously?

Let’s try, this week, to keep our wandering eyes on the academic ball.  How far will we hit if we do?

(By the way, I wrote this message Saturday morning before I did anything but sip my coffee.)

What are you going to focus on this week?

Should You Write a Book?

If you are thinking about an academic book project, read on...

I have a coaching client who received tenure a year ago (we've worked together since he was a second year assistant professor trying to finish his dissertation) and now he's at the point in his career when he wants to write his first book.

I’m sending this client excerpts of David Perlmutter’s article "Why Would Anyone Write a Book on That?" published in 2005 in the Chronicle.  Perlmutter, an Associate Professor of Mass Communications at Louisiana State, is currently writing a book on Political Blogs (great topic, right?) I thought that his tips might interest some of you:

“Most professors have faced a choice that they know will affect their career, and possibly their health and sanity: Should I write a book on ... ?

The confident demeanors of many an academic hide anguish about whether, when, and on what subject to roll the dice of writing a book.

Why should I write the book? That is, would it simply duplicate existing work? Or would it do a better job of covering a topic that others have written about, or look at the topic in a new way?

Will the subject keep your interest until you've finished writing? Seen as part of a long academic career, a book is like a short but intense love affair. Some subjects seem intriguing at first but become boring over time. Write about something that fascinates you and that will continue to lure you to the keyboard.

Do you want to write this book? Don't let a publisher, agent, or reviewers force you to write a book that doesn't appeal to you. A friend of mine recently received a series of reviews of a book proposal, all of which pushed her to revise her plans in ways she didn't find compelling. Convinced that the reviewers wanted her to write their book, not hers, she walked away from the project.

Who will publish the book, and who will read it? A book must fit with other publications at a press, or marketing the title becomes prohibitively expensive. But be realistic in predicting the audience for your book when you contact a potential publisher. Editors laugh when they read a book proposal for a study of Thuringian crafts in the 14th century that the author promises will reach a wide readership.

Are you ready to write this book now? It is difficult for professors to acknowledge that anything is beyond us -- even for the moment. But ours is a business with longevity; therefore, don't start a book before you feel fully confident about writing it. An emeritus professor told me about his current project, "I'm glad I'm writing this book when I'm 80; I wasn't mature enough to write it when I was 60."

Will you be able to finish the book? I have seen colleagues paralyzed by the inability to complete a book manuscript. Although unforeseen disasters like illness are sometimes to blame, more often the problem is that the author is obsessed with perfection, wanting to write not just a book but the book on the topic. While I would never suggest abandoning the quest for quality, no volume can treat any subject to exhaustion. If you don't think you'll be able to finish a book, don't start it.

Do you have time to write a book? A professor's day can easily fill up with class preparation, meetings with students, bureaucratic work, institutional service, and all the minutiae of higher education. Grabbing an hour here and there is not enough for a book. Plan ahead how to put aside for the book days or large sections of days during the semester, or weeks or months during vacations and sabbaticals. If you're writing a book, you will need lots of time to sit and think -- with no interruptions, or even a threat of an interruption.

What about logistical support? Writing a book may involve costs like hiring an assistant, traveling, or paying to use proprietary data or copyrighted material. Make sure you know where the money will come from before you get started.

Does your department head know what you're planning? Few of us enjoy the good fortune of Harvard's John Rawls, who -- as Richard Bradley reports in Harvard Rules (HarperCollins, 2005) -- published almost nothing for two decades but received no pressure or admonitions from his superiors, and then produced A Theory of Justice, "perhaps the most important work of political philosophy published in the last half-century." You should discuss your goals with administrators, giving them a realistic estimate of the time and effort the book will take.

But the decision to write any book begins with honest self-evaluation: Is this the right book for me to write, right now? No one can answer that question but you.

Excellent advice, right? More advice is welcome…

Rejection Resiliency

“The majority of men [and women] meet with failure because of their lack of persistence in creating new plans to take the place of those that fail.”
                            --    Napoleon Hill

In my experience as a coach and consultant, resilience in the face of rejection is the single biggest factor in differentiating successful from unsuccessful academics.

• If you’ve failed your comps, reschedule them.
• If your dissertation proposal failed the first-round critique, meet with each member of your committee and formulate a new plan.
• If you’ve struck out on the job market this year, publish that article so that you’ll look good next year.
• If your article has been rejected, send it to a lower-tier journal rather than the rubbish bin.
• If your grant has been rejected, remind yourself of the low percentage of submissions that get funded, make the reviewers changes, and resubmit during the next cycle.

Unless you get back on the horse you’ll never get to the end of the trail.

End Guilt

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“You can make a good case that guilt,
not agriculture or the wheel, may be the
foundation of civilization.”

Richard O’Connor, PhD.
“Undoing Perpetual Stress” p.145

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Did you do everything you thought that you should this week?
How did you feel about falling short?
Self-critical? Frustrated? Guilty?

If you tend to feel guilty about things done or not done, I would suggest that you try to shift those
feelings.

Contrary to what many people believe, guilt is not a good motivator.

Here’s how my internal dialogue sometimes goes:
“I really should get to work.”
“But I don’t want to.”
“But I have to.”
Then I just don’t do it.

Enter the specter of guilt.

When I avoid starting the most important item on my “To Do” list, I often find myself feeling guilty.

However, just as when another person makes me feel guilty, I find myself a bit annoyed and resentful when I feel guilty. The small sour drips of shame don’t make me feel more like working. Instead, the
feelings beg to be buried in a bag of Pepperidge Farm cookies, or a nap, or a novel, or a little web surfing.
And so it goes. Leading to another day of unpleasant procrastination.

What’s the solution?

Try being kinder to yourself for the next seven days.
Push those guilty voices out of your mind.
See what happens. You just might find that you get more accomplished when you stop berating yourself.

Guilt may be the foundation of civilization. But don’t you think that it is a pretty unstable foundation?
I’d rather base my life on other feelings such as acceptance and gratitude. I feels so much better when I ease up on the nagging self-criticisms.

Good luck banishing guilt. And let us know if you have any tools to combat the evil emotion.