Feeds:
Posts
Comments

Archive for the ‘fears’ Category

A caller asked if I had ever coached someone who had become stalled on a house renovation project.  My answer was no, but what came to mind was how similar all big projects are.   How difficult it can be to keep going.  How crushing the project can become.  But it doesn’t have to be this [...]

Read Full Post »

Many readers of Successful Writing Tips are looking for help with motivation.  And they also are interested in what mental toughness has to do with motivation. As a dissertation writer, you may often find yourself in chaos, frustrated, with no easy way out.  You’re not alone.  Many other writers find themselves in a similar predicament. A [...]

Read Full Post »

Most people I know speak of a recurring nightmare: –Having to take a test you haven’t studied for –Having to give a talk, but being unprepared –Not being able to get to the location where your talk or test is to be given –Feeling under great tension and wearing yourself out trying to accomplish something [...]

Read Full Post »

  Many times writers hire me to coach them because they’re stuck.  They haven’t made substantial progress on their dissertation for months.  What stuck often means is that the writers are having trouble claiming a chunk of time for the writing because of time-sucks.  Time-sucks come in all sizes and shapes.  Facebook and email will be your [...]

Read Full Post »

Is a non-negotiable deadline closing in on you?  Has it been set by your university?  Or is a job – perhaps a postdoc– resting on your finishing your dissertation soon? As you struggle to meet the deadline, it can feel as if you are barreling downhill on an icy, bumpy slope.  And you fear that [...]

Read Full Post »

Writing a dissertation is full of black holes that can swallow you up. Boldness allows you to embrace hope and can make the impossible seem possible. In the short story “Incoming Tide,” Pulitzer Prize winning writer Elizabeth Strout captures the essence of what might result from the interplay of boldness, hope, and perseverance. “Incoming Tide,” [...]

Read Full Post »

 When and how do we acquire the skills, voice, critical perspectives, and confidence needed for successful writing?   Specifically to write successfully a dissertation and, for that matter, the book that follows the dissertation? Years ago as a first-year college student, I tested out of composition class, but all students at my university were required to [...]

Read Full Post »

Nearly every day I receive email from people who are making no or next to no progress on their dissertations.  They are scared of the future and ashamed of having let so much time go by. They complain about feeling isolated–working far from their universities, having little contact with their advisors, and having no colleagues [...]

Read Full Post »

Have you gone absent from your dissertation?  As far as your advisor is concerned, have you just disappeared?  When did you last contact your advisor?  Is hiding out weighing heavily on you?  We all have reasons for putting off doing something as big and seemingly endless as writing a dissertation, but usually the reasons seem less important when [...]

Read Full Post »

How was your Sunday?  Productive?  Or another day with only good intentions? If you don’t have much to show for the day, would you say that anxiety did you in?   You know the signs of anxiety.  You know when you’re getting high-jacked by a fear of one kind or another commonly associated with writing.  [...]

Read Full Post »

Older Posts »

Follow

Get every new post delivered to your Inbox.

Join 81 other followers