Earlier this summer my work went something like this: reading journal articles – fine, making notes –  fine, planning -fine ,  mind maps -fine, thinking about things -fine, meeting people for lunch excellent, writing actual words – not so good.

A typical morning would be boot up the computer, open my note book and try to write a paragraph of my response to some new literature.  I’d stare at the screen for about 25 minutes  without typing and tackle it head on by looking up a recipe for soap. Soap for everyone for Christmas, hurrah!  Perhaps I’ll become an aroma-therapist. Look at watch, time for a mug of tea, mmm the kitchen needs a wipe…here we go.

Lovely windows.

My problem(s) FEAR & LOATHING. I’m afraid. I’m really afraid. This will never be over and there’ll be more recommendations, more changes. The examiner will hate me. I can’t write. It’s never going to be over, not now, not then, no never. Hmm I think I’ll bleach my tea spoons.

A v quick bit of online research suggests that procrastination is often rooted in fear of failure. There is a useful handout at the writing centre all about it.  Also I came across a person who claims they procrastinated over their thesis for  two decades and reading their story made me feel better about myself I have to say

According to the usefull handout I’m guilty of at least 3 of the most commone pro-cras strategies

Substitute something important for something really important? (For example, cleaning instead of writing your paper = very clean teaspoons)

Let a short break become a long one, or an evening in which you do no work at all? (For example, claiming that you are going to watch TV for ½ hour, then watching it all night = watching an entire series of Gossip Girl in 48 hours..perhaps Chuck Bass might ‘arrange’ me a docturate sigh).

Spend too much time researching or choosing a topic (= I have read everything ever, I’m not kidding. I’m now at the point where I’m ordering unpublished manucripts from the 19th Century from obscure libraries).

Does any of this sound familiar? Sadly I think it may. The is at least one PhD & procrastination group on facebook with over 500 members. The latest news feed says “fffuuuuuuuck i hate my thesis” ( apologies for bad language these words are not my own). There’s even a forum.

The good news is there’s lots of tips out there for tackling pro-cras.  50 tips here and  some nice Zen habits here.  Common tips are chop up tasks into mini ones, make mini deadlines, make deadlines public, schedule a reward, have a routine, banish distractions. Also a really fascinating article about the science of pro-cras with some handy hints about building up stamina and will power to get things done in the same way one would train for a physical task like a marathon; the article suggests

you must treat your daily work like a competitive athletic event. Your self-control is a muscle. If you don’t tend to it through rigorous training and careful schedules of use, you’ll perform well below your potential..

There’s immense value to be found in trying to understand procrastination and getting to the bottom of why you’re prone to thinking in a certain way, IMHO is the 1st step to getting going. Realising that I do what I do, because I’m frightened has been liberating and now when I’ve a morning which starts badly I can label my thoughts and say to myself “I’m procrastinating”. In doing so, for me it seems to now stop it in it’s tracks. There is a really good talk at audio dharma on thinking which explains this technique and can help with lots of other things and noisy thoughts. The speaker talks about how our absorption in our thoughts pulls us away from being present and how we create an adversarial relationship with our thoughts. It suggests you work with what’s going on rather than resist it. It’s been a big help to me.

Look. Clean teaspoons!

Mini deadline and rewards don’t work for me. I miss the deadline and then give myself the reward anyway, because I’m nice  and I deserve it. What has helped , is adopting the Pomodoro technique.

The author says…

I found myself in a slump, a time of low productivity and high confusion. Every day I went to school, attended classes, studied and went back home with the disheartened feeling that I didn’t really knowwhat I’d been doing, that I’d been wasting my time

It’s based on the idea of tackling tasks  for 25 minutes at a time. You’ll notice a difference in your work  and productivity almost immediately.  You can down load a free booklet to get started that takes 25 minutes to read. Or even better, there’s a quick crib sheet to get you started.

Once again best of luck. Procrastination is a horrible horrible state of being. Be nice to yourself, don’t judge yourself. if you’re in it, just notice it – it’s the first step to moving forward. Good Luck!

When I was starting to think about what I wanted to say, I came across and incredibly sad blog post. The author begins by saying something along the lines of ” My PhD has literally been an emotional rollercoaster — sometimes, I feel like a manic-depressive.”  But, the real tragedy is the many comments which run from 2006 until October of this year from people stuck in a 5 year or 6 year black hole of revision, corrections, fallings out, rejections, bad advice and isolation. That’s 4 years of comments people. 4 YEARS OF COMMENTS from PhD students with pretty much nowhere else to go to articulate their very real woes. I can’t express how much reading it both touched and saddened me. It made me muster up all the loving kindness I can manage and send it out into the t’interweb of dreams.

Here’s a sample of what people  said

I have come to terms with realizing the most difficult part of a PhD is coming face forward with one’s own weaknesses (loneliness, procrastination, fear of rejection). I think we all go through it.

I am into severe depression phase. I am just wondering can I get out of it someday, I feel like its just increasing day by day.

I’ve just been agonizing over endless visions and revisions. I’ve poured so much of my life into preparing for an academic vocation that abandonning the degree is out of the question. I would rather die than not finish

This has been a nightmare that is hopefully coming to an end now that I am letting go of it, but god it is painful, still.

The worse thing for me in this whole process has been the isolation

PhD depression has hit hard and I’ve contemplated quitting

I’ve become severely disillusioned by the way things work in academia and i’m becoming more and more cynical by the day

I so desperately want to say something positive  and helpful now about the experience of doing revisions. At the beginning of the year a few people said to me “this will make you stronger and a better researcher” and ” you’ll realise that at the end of this process you’ll have a better thesis” . I’m sure these things are true, but to be honest I don’t feel them…yet.  My experience has been emotional and  lonely. Before gathering the strength to carry on I looked humiliation and doubt in the face. The treatment I received from one of the examiners, particularly  after the viva, was so deeply unkind that it caused weeks of misery and insomnia, followed by a total crisis of confidence. Their behavior led me to question my own beliefs about anger and compassion and that is to say nothing of the effects on my finances, research, career plans, relationships and even the roof over my head. But it is possible to acknowledge these negative emotions and not respond and thus give into them.  So let me really begin here by telling you a few things I’ve done to cope with the sadness and fustration in the hope they may help.

• Complain, but for the love of god, please complain sensibly. Separate the wheat from the chaff. Some of what is recommended will be useful, but don’t accept bad behavior on the part of the examiner. I registered my intension to appeal & went to the S.U and the vice chancellor and as dispassionately as I could manage – I made sure people knew how the examiner had behaved  after the viva and what they’d very publicly done and said. Although I did not receive explanation or apology from the examiner, they agreed to step down from examining my work. Then and this is really important file away any remaining anger and put your energy into getting on with your work. Even say to yourself I will finish the PhD first and then deal with seeking an emotional resolution.
• Listen to the soundtrack of the 1972  Jimmy Cliff film “The Harder they come”. I’m not joking. This is a serious remedy.

If you’ve had a nasty set-to  like me, listen to The Harder they Come track first: feel cross, imagine retribution etc etc and then come out the other side with an I’ll show you attitude, and by this I mean I’ll show you with the quality of my work not argy bargy. Draw your strength at Draw your breaks. Wallow in procrastination or marvel at the ineptitude of the university system during Sitting in Limbo. Purge yourself of desolation by listening to the achingly beautiful version of Many Rivers to Cross. Feel the stress and frustration at Pressure Drop – finally  the grande finale: You can get it if you really want. I defy anyone to listen to this track and not feel even a tiny murmur of motivation

• Tell people who you care about and who care about you – how you feel. They won’t understand. It doesn’t matter. Simply saying how you feel will help. Be 100% honest. If you feel like shit say so.
• Separate yourself from your work. You are not your corrections. You are not your writing. You are not your thesis. This is your mantra. Chant it.
• If you can  - get some exercise and meditate. Sit quietly for 5 minutes close your eyes and concentrate on your breath. Thoughts and anxieties will pop into your head, just acknowledge them and go back to how your breath feels. Monkey mind describes that horrible state when your brain is all over the place, thoughts are going off on tangents and it’s hard to concentrate. Just 5 minutes of mediation will really help to calm this and do wonders if you’re feeling depressed. It also helps with procrastination too.

Some more comprehensive and great tips on staying sane during a  PhD & depression to be found here too.

I hope this helps someone a little bit.  There is more to come I promise, especially on dealing with fear and procrastination, but meanwhile if there is anyone reading this who feels anything like some of the comments from the other blog post on depression I mentioned, remember you are not alone. I wish you the best.

The 10 perfections are

1. Generosity (dana).
2. Virtue (sila).
3. Renunciation (nekkhamma).
4. Wisdom (panna).
5. Energy (viriya).
6. Patience (khanti).
7. Truthfulness (sacca).
8. Determination (aditthana).
9. Loving-kindness (metta).
10. Equanimity (upekkha).

The 10 perfections strike me as a really good Q.A framework for “writing up” a thesis.

A PhD is an apprenticeship in research. Nevertheless, for the majority of research students it is the single biggest piece of work they will ever produce in their lifetime, and therefore an expression of a significant personal journey. It takes years of devotion and truly is more than research and critical thinking. It’s a commitment to an idea and an “original contribution to knowledge”; it is a massive deal. However, I think that many people get carried away with what I’ll call Magnus opus syndrome. Sometimes it’s very easy to lose sight of the bigger picture and remember where a thesis sits in the scheme of life, all things woo-woo. Universe = BIG Thesis = small.

Anyway that said, I do see a lovely connection with the paramis and trying to get the old per her der finished. Thinking about and applying them to my research and life has certainly helped to get through some of the more difficult times recently. Generosity for instance is the key paramis to achieving the others because it includes all the others. It means being openhearted and letting go of the past or any negative habits. I have found this really helpful by turning it on myself when I’ve had days where I’ve struggled with writers block or haven’t quite achieved what I’d set out at the beginning of the day. It’s about living in the present moment and saying OK never mind about that and refocusing on being skillful in the now.

Paramis aren’t elaborate concepts either, which is one of the things I like about them. Employing the notions of say determination and energy to studying is fairly straightforward, but I also particularly like the ideas of truthfulness, patience, and equanimity.

Obviously one needs to be truthful when presenting an analysis, but I think really listening to what your heart tells you, and being brave enough to be honest about ideas is actually quite hard and occasionally scary. What if they’re rubbish thoughts? What if someone says durrrr – of course, and anyway? Yet, some of my best ideas have been my most uncomplicated ones and in the emerging thesis, I’m being to see that the original contribution to knowledge I’m making comes from simplicity rather than complexity. It’s about stripping away ideas to find ‘a truth’.

A PhD is one looooooooooonnnnnnnnng exercise in patience, in the sense that of course one needs amazing staying power to get to through the other side. Mental endurance if you like – comme ca the Japanese game show. But another sort of patience is also required because a PhD does not come all at once. It really is a series of processes. It can be absolutely infuriating to have to re-draft research proposals, aims and objects over and over, or spend an entire year conducting a literature review on a topic that – OK you become a world expert on for 10 minutes, but can’t bare to discuss with anyone for even 1 minute, because you are sick of hearing words, like for instance “commodity fetishism” or “branding” said aloud in the same utterance. But be patient if you can, because it does all come together. I was chatting with the supers about this only the other day. Although I cursed having to draft, redraft and re-redraft various documents for thesis outline or transfer meetings, because of the process my objectives eventually became razor sharp and one of the most useful tools in allowing me to crack on so quickly now. Know why? The objectives function, and I’ve actually stuck to them. Yup, they’re good.

Equanimity is also very important to Buddhism. In fact it’s fundamental to finding awakening. It is according most dictionaries a type of “mental composure”, especially in the face of adversity. It’s actually one of my favourite words at the moment. It’s to this week, what ambivalent was to last week. It’s difficult when writing up, because it can be pretty intense when you’re immersed, or having to put in long lonely days. Most of time in the final stages of a PhD is spent just with thoughts, and I think this is what is probably both the source of all the stress, and what sends people a bit la la. It’s an experience you can’t really communicate to anyone unless they’ve been through it, which can be a further source of isolation and inequity. This slightly off kilter state of mind can’t be explained to, nor understood by anyone who hasn’t done a PhD. Equanimity can definitely be refined, and I have found the more I meditate on it, the more steady I feel about the task in hand, so the more able I am to get on with it. Cultivating a balance of mind is therefore, extremely useful.

Om Shanti Om

kool & the gang celebrating good times with me

Week one: Really only ½ a week but euphoria at being free to “begin to finish” I experienced joy at loafing around re-reading Marx and organising lever arch files. I skipped home from the gym mid morning and visualized finishing the thesis ahead of the timeline. This would allow me to spend the rest of special leave mooching in galleries, eating brunch at Providores, reading Vogue, and attending intellectual salons all over Europe. How cool was my life? Waaaayaaaay cool.

Week two: I wore chunky knits, reading glasses, and silk neckerchiefs. I was serious goddamnit, and my fashion story necessarily reflected this. Went to the library, saw my supervisors, read journal articles, updated my bibliography, structured chapters. As my favourite stylist Jay Immanuel is fond of saying to the models during shoots, work as if the rent is due tomorrow. Top Model? Pah! Britains next top thesis more like it. I was serving it.

Week three: was awake and at my desk before most people had their first thoughts of coffee. I’ll never finish, so best just give up sleep. Whilst the rest of the country slept I read Foucault and drew mind maps. I wondered if Foucault had drawn mind maps? I listen to Running up that Hill and decided if I only could I would make a deal with God to swap places. I wondered if Kate Bush had done mind maps? I became fanatical about creating the ultimate brain-food open sandwich and drew a mind map of various toppings. Finally on the Sunday I was lured to Hotel du Vin for a long lunch at someone else’s expense. Only fine dining broke the cycle. I went home to sleep for 48 hours.

avacado food of the gods & top of the charts for open sandwiches

Week four brought a vicious bought of impostor syndrome. I considered the possibility of simply handing in a one page mind map in lieu of the actual thesis and keeping my fingers crossed the external moderator might be wooed by my uncommon approach and ability to accessorizes any outfit. Obsessed with a fear of obscurity I chose wine and socialising, followed closely by self-reproach, more alcohol, more going out. This is intriguing, because despite all the hoo-haring, I somehow produced a prologue and introduction.

Week 5: It is so “on”. I’m giving it some ones and twos on the thesis front. I’ve sent work to the project supervisors ahead of time and everything. Had a paper published, found out I’d been quoted in Times Higher Education, and got contacted by a journalist from California interested in my not quite written thesis.

Consequently I’m indulging in a soupcon of fabulousness for a few days. Oh Oui. Mes lecteurs chéris et personnes très intelligentes I am away to Paris. The land of abundant éclairs, where the men say bonjour mademoiselle, and even regular folk have “le look”. I love Paris in Spring-time.