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Friendship Boosts Productivity

Posted in academic, alliances, dissertation coach, dissertation writing, isolated, isolation, motivation, positive psychology, reasons for not writing, resilience, top strengths, using your strengths, write more easily, tagged , , , , , , , on August 8, 2011| Leave a Comment »

When you’re writing a dissertation, it’s likely that you’ll feel isolated.  Many dissertators say how much they long to be back at the university where they could talk with their peers about their ideas and their writing.

Too often the isolated dissertation writer feels less than excited about the writing.  And productivity suffers.

Talking with others helps you to bounce back when you’re feeling down.  But sometimes you think that only others who are in the same situation can empathize with you.

You may avoid the people with whom you could have contact because you think they wouldn’t want to talk about your writing.  You may be right.  But you may have other things in common.

  • Someone with whom you enjoy sharing lunch or talking to about the kids or the football game or the  3K race coming up Sunday
  •  Someone with whom you can compare prices and benefits of one gym over another
  •  Someone to whom you can reveal your less-than-complete knowledge or understanding of a product or the way your car works

Positive Psychology researchers contend that one of the most important ways to improve one’s job satisfaction is by having a friend at work.  Similarly, when you’re struggling with a dissertation, having a friend to chat with can give you a boost and improve the way you look at your job as a writer.

Having a friend helps to bring out the best in you. If you feel that someone recognizes your worth as a person and also shares some of your values, you will probably feel more confident in exercising your strengths and talents.

The more you can use your strengths, the more likely it is that you will feel more resilient about your writing.  And resilience brings greater productivity.

When you’re feeling alone or perhaps that the world is against you, look around for a friend.  Aristotle said, “The antidote for 50 enemies is one friend.”

I’m curious whether you think it would be worth your time to cultivate a friend.  I’d love to hear what you think.
Nancy

Nancy Whichard, Ph.D., PCC

Your International Dissertation Coach and Academic Career Coach

www.smarttipsforwriters.com

http://www.dissertationbootcamp.net

http://www.nancywhichard.com

nancy @ nancywhichard.com

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5 Tips for Creating a Breakthrough When You Have a Hands-off Dissertation Advisor

Posted in academic, advisor, alliances, coaching, courage, creativity, curiosity, dissertation advisors, dissertation coach, dissertation writing, isolated, momentum, perseverance, planning, resources, restart writing, strategies, tagged , , , , on October 5, 2010| Leave a Comment »

Six degrees of separation: Artistic visualization.

Image via Wikipedia

 

“I’ve had very little, if any, support from my advisor or my committee,” and so began another coaching call this morning with the writer of a dissertation. 

Many dissertation coaching clients say that their advisors are hands-off, giving little or no substantive feedback, or not wanting to see a dissertation at all until it’s complete. 

Does this sound familiar?  Do you feel you’ve depleted your resources, and you need some content-specific help? 

What to do? Here are some ideas from some of my coaching colleagues and also from some of my clients. 

1.  You shouldn’t have to look outside your program for content-specific help.  If you have a coach, one of your coaching goals could be improving communication with your advisor (or someone else on your committee) who has the relevant background knowledge. Work with your coach to plan your strategy. 

2. If you can think of someone who might know someone who can get you closer to a source, you will eventually succeed.  Think about Stanley Milgram‘s Small World experiment (which inspired the Six Degrees of Separation book and movie.) 

3. Post a question on Linked-In or make up your own study group. 

4.  Engage a willing friend, colleague, or coach to read some of your text and ask you questions about what’s going on.  Tell your reader to be curious.  You want a naïve reader, not a critical expert. The right questions can help you move toward a breakthrough. 

5.  Take a class!  
As a client phrased it, “Make your own Woody Allen moment—here comes the director onto the stage.”  Figure out who could be your Woody Allen. Who is the person you most want to learn from? Then sign up for a class from that person, and write the paper for the class.  

If your project has stalled and your advisor offers minimal to no support, you need a strategy. Think Small World.  Or make your own Woody Allen moment.  

Above all, prepare for a breakthrough. 

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To Write Your Dissertation or Book, Make a Break

Posted in balancing dissertation with work and family, creativity, finishing the dissertation, generate ideas for writing, getting started, hope, isolated, isolation, life, memories, self-care, start writing, strategies, success, write more easily, writing, writing breaks, zest, tagged , , , , , , , on March 15, 2010| Leave a Comment »

A little after noon on Sunday as I was driving  to the Regional Post Office, which is open on Sundays, I turned on NPR radio and happened upon Garrison Keillor, telling one of his yarns on “Prairie Home Companion.”

Even though I enjoy Garrison Keillor’s humor, I immediately felt weepy.

On far too many Sunday afternoons a number of years ago, I would leave my home and my family and head to my office where I would work on my dissertation.  Each Sunday during that drive I listened to Garrison Keillor.  While I don’t regret putting in the hard work it took to finish the dissertation, it came at a cost.

While Keillor’s voice triggers some sad memories and brings up conflicts that I had to deal with as a parent and a wife, I’m also struck by the quickness of the unexpected, forgotten connection.  Our past can rush to meet us triggered by the briefest of sounds.  Or a new idea can occur to us at the confluence of a setting, a sound, and a memory.

That possibility of a sudden memory or an insight and, unlikely as it seems, sadness that can turn to hope through reframing reminded me of a client who is attempting to write a novel.  After having worked at it for quite a while, she feels as if she has nothing new to give to the project.  And she’s slipping into a stuck place where nothing stirs her.

To get unstuck, we may have to open ourselves to memories, to the unexpected, to the coming together of past and present.  Or we may have to break our routine and try something different.

I might have generated more ideas for  my dissertation and then have been a more lively and efficient writer had I given myself permission occasionally to stay at home on Sunday afternoons, or  if as a family, we had gone somewhere together on more of those days.

To generate ideas, consider making a break in your routine:
1. Take a walk or go for a jog.
2.   Go to the library or a coffee shop.
3.  If funds permit, take your laptop and check into a hotel.
4.  Trade houses or apartments with someone.
5.  House-sit for a week or two for a friend.
6.  Change the scenery—go to the zoo or to a park.
7.  Awaken your senses– surprise yourself with something different on the radio or buy a new kind of coffee or tea.
8.  Remind yourself of a time when you were bold or brave or when you did something difficult.

Sometimes writing and meeting deadlines need more than perseverance.

All good wishes,

Nancy

Nancy Whichard, Ph.D., PCC
Your International Dissertation Coach and Academic Career Coach

www.nancywhichard.com
www.dissertationbootcamp.net
www.usingyourstrengths.com
www.smarttipsforwriters.com

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To Make Progress on Your Dissertation, Stop Hiding Out

Posted in academic, accountability, advisor, dissertation advisors, dissertation coach, dissertation writing, fears, getting started, isolated, isolation, re-group, re-start, restart writing, self-sabotage, Smart Tips, write more easily, tagged , , , , , , , on August 31, 2009| Leave a Comment »

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 or friends involved in a similar process.  

That kind of isolation can be overwhelming and can keep you stuck.

It’s up to you to reach out to others.

Here are four tips for successful writing:

• What helped you to write when you were still on campus? Create an atmosphere, a feeling, or a semblance of campus right where you are that is conducive to writing.

• Seek out places to write where people are writing and reading — a public library, a university library, a coffee shop, even rental office space. Go there routinely, and as you settle in nod and smile at others who are also there regularly.

• Reach out to others who will buddy-up with you.

• Hire a dissertation coach or writing coach who will help you set goals and who will support you. You don’t have to be entirely alone during this process, and you shouldn’t be.  It isn’t healthy and it isn’t smart.
 
Put forward some effort in order to feel more connected. 

All the best,

Nancy

P.S.  Last chance to get the September on-line Smart Tips for Writers newsletter. You haven’t heard of it?  Is that why you haven’t signed up for it?  Don’t waste another minute—sign up at my website: .

Nancy Whichard, Ph.D., PCC
Your International Dissertation Coach and Academic Career Coach

www.nancywhichard.com
www.dissertationbootcamp.net

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Like Writing, Exercise Needs to be a Habit: Nine Benefits for Writers

Posted in anxiety, coaching, creativity, discipline, dissertation coach, dissertation writing, exercise, getting started, happiness, inertia, isolated, planning, productivity, restart writing, running, self-care, start writing, time, time management, write more easily, writing, tagged , , on July 26, 2009| Leave a Comment »

“How would I rate my self-care this week, particularly in the area of exercise?” is one of the questions I ask my clients to think about before we have our coaching call.

Since many of my coaching clients are writers, and many of those writers are trying to find time to write a dissertation, I have a hard sell in trying to convince them to put more time into exercising.  One client says, “I just loathe ‘working out,’ especially since it uses up so much valuable time.”

And another response– “I can’t even imagine how I would enjoy adding regular exercise into my daily routine without hating every minute of it.”

To fight my own resistance to exercise, I plan my weekly schedule around exercise.  Like writing, exercise needs to be a habit.

Here are nine benefits that I have found from exercising:

1. It improves my mood.  After I exercise, it is always easier to start writing because I am in a good mood.

2.  It helps me think. My creativity is unleashed.  Ideas pop into my mind while I’m working out.

3.  It frees my mind to process ideas that I had been working on or issues that I haven’t been actively engaged with.

4.  It dissipates anxiety.  I’m always much calmer and more relaxed once I have exercised.

5.  It vents some of my meanness, allowing me to be the nice person I like to think I am.

6.  I have more energy on a daily basis if I’ve been exercising regularly.

7.  It eats calories and also helps control my eating.  Controlling my emotional eating is a great thing.

8.  It fights Alzheimer’s.  Also, if you’re thin and at one time you were a smoker, you should be exercising /lifting weights to fight osteoporosis.

9.  When I exercise with a group, I fight feelings of loneliness that are all too common with writers (and introverts). 

And here’s a bonus reason:  Rather than taking too much time, exercise actually helps me be a more productive writer.

Are you including exercise in your schedule?  How are you doing that?  I’d love to hear from you.

All the best,

Nancy

P.S.  Could exercising be one of your goals for August and September?  Email me to help put some specifics around a goal. 

Nancy Whichard, Ph.D., PCC
Your International Dissertation and Academic Career Coach

www.nancywhichard.com
www.usingyourstrengths.com

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Make Getting Started on Your Writing Easier: Top 5 Reasons to Develop a No-Kidding, No-Fooling Daily Writing Habit

Posted in accountability, commitment, determination, discipline, dissertation coach, dissertation writing, distractions, getting started, isolated, isolation, mental toughness, momentum, procrastination, research, self-deception, self-sabotage, Smart Tips, take charge, time management, tagged , , , , , on December 29, 2008| 1 Comment »

What if writing each day on your dissertation was a habit?  What would you gain from that?

Do you know the power of habit?

Here are the top 5 reasons for developing a solid, robust, no-kidding daily writing habit:

1.  You would not lose time and energy fighting the internal battles of whether you would write today.

2.  Your writing would come easily to mind at random moments during the day, giving you the opportunity to have new ideas and to make new connections.

3.  You wouldn’t have to find time to write—the time would be there, available, ready-made, dedicated to your work.

4.  You would replace distraction and self-deception with a solid, reliable writing habit.

5.  You would be writing on your dissertation every day.

Too often when ABD’s are isolated, working alone and with little accountability to anyone, a daily writing habit is far from reality.

Just as often, newly minted PhD’s working in their first appointment have lost the writing momentum they once had and are now procrastinating on their own writing.  They think they have no time for their research projects, or they’re making up excuses not to write.  They may distract and even deceive themselves to keep from writing.

I’m putting together some strategies that should put a habit in place that will give you the muscle you need to push distractions and self-deceptions aside and start a new day in your writing life.

Many writers who have been part of dissertation boot camps have high praise for the results and give their experience rave reviews.

If you’re interested in a virtual boot camp, you might want to check out my website at www.nancywhichard.com or sign up for my free e-newsletter.  I have an article on boot camps in the next issue that will go out right away.  Sign up at www.nancywhichard.com.

I’d love to hear from you if you have some ideas or strategies that can help make writing each day a habit or if you’re interested in gaining an intense, daily writing habit.

Best wishes,

Nancy
Nancy Whichard, Ph.D., PCC
Your International Dissertation and Academic Career Coach

www.nancywhichard.com

 

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What Is the University’s Responsibility to an ABD Struggling with Her Writing?

Posted in academic, accountability, advice, coaching, coherence, discourse, dissertation advisors, dissertation coach, dissertation writing, isolated, isolation, resilience, resources, setbacks, Smart Tips, struggling, teaching writing, training, unclear writing, underprepared students, word usage, writing, writing, dissertation, tagged , , , , on March 5, 2008| Leave a Comment »

An ABD’s dilemmas with her writing underscore for me the problems dissertation writers have when they’re isolated from campus and from an advisor during the dissertation process.

As a dissertation coach, I don’t fix people’s writing, but I listen, and if a client sends me some text, I see what the writing looks like.

This morning a dissertation writer talked about several pages of a chapter. In these pages she writes, in part, the history of a movement.

She came to me because her advisor gives her no feedback.  She had sent him some pages, and it’s obvious he didn’t read the work or, if he did, he decided he wouldn’t involve himself in her process. He says she’s doing great!

The introduction to the survey of literature is murky, repetitious, hard to follow.  It goes on for page after page. She tries to write in what she thinks is the expected discourse. She hurries, compresses, meanders, and throws in rhetorical flourishes.

No one has told her that the convoluted language is confusing.  Nobody has told her, in effect, to choose a traffic lane and stick with it.

In the second half, where she presents the background material, she says, “I don’t have any concepts in here.’  It seems to me that her writing becomes clearer in this second half of the group of pages, but she dismisses that writing as “baby-ish.” She is in a hurry to wrap up the telling of the history because it seems obvious to her.

When she talks aloud to me about her ideas for the dissertation, she sounds competent and clear, but she knows that she has problems when she writes. She is spinning her wheels.

I have faith in her.  I know that she can turn this around, but she is looking at quite an investment of time.

I have to ask:  Did her university prepare her for writing this dissertation?
What responsibility does her advisor have toward her?

What do you think?

Until next time,

Nancy

Nancy Whichard, Ph.D., PCC
Your International Dissertation Coach and Academic Career Coach
nancy @ nancywhichard.com
http://www.nancywhichard.com

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