How do you keep focused on your writing goal? Our Lizard Brains can make it all too easy to let a goal slip, and with each deadline or marker you miss, it’s that much longer before you finish your dissertation.
FutureMe at www.futureme.org is a helpful tool for accountability as you write your dissertation.
You can send an email to your future self anywhere from one month to 30 years or more in the future. But let’s not think about 30 years from now!
Let’s talk about your short-term goals.
Here’s my request– write an email to yourself to be delivered close to the time of your next deadline or short-term goal (and I’m hoping that deadline is within the next 6 weeks). Write in that email the specifics that you have in place that will make hitting that deadline a cinch.
Make sure that you include in the email the distractions you must say no to if you are to reach your writing goal.
When your Future Self receives this email, it will be cause for celebration. You have stuck to your plan, and the email is a pat on the back for you.
Such things as FutureMe are great ways to help you stay on track.
Another way to keep you accountable is to hire a dissertation coach.
The more frequently you check up on yourself and the more importance you attach to doing what you said you would do, the sooner the diss will be over and done with.
How are you doing with accountability? Need some help with that? I’d love to hear from you.
All good wishes,
Nancy
Nancy Whichard, Ph.D., PCC
Your International Dissertation and Academic Career Coach
www.dissertationbootcamp.net
www.usingyourstrengths.com
www.smarttipsforwriters.com
