Week Four – Day Four
Keep It Small
I recently met a friend of mine with an enviable career in academia for coffee. She mentioned that she had been seeing a therapist, because for the past couple of months she couldn’t seem to write. After a number of sessions the therapist asked her: “How did you write before? What was different then, that allowed you to write, that has changed?” Her answer was that “I just did it, without expectations. It was just a paper.” Without expectations. Just a paper. Aha! By now, this far into her career, she expected herself to ‘write better’, to write more intelligent, more eloquent, more groundbreaking papers. To be a more intellectual version of herself. The expectation alone scared her so much it stopped her dead in her tracks. She stopped writing altogether. It tends to be what fear of failure, a fear of falling short, does.
Writer’s block
Whenever expectations are too high (your own or the expectations of others), writing becomes incredibly difficult. You get scared. You stop. Getting going become near impossible. The PhD becomes a torturous journey. Towards the end of the PhD this happens as a matter of course. All of a sudden you envision a finished version of your manuscript, all out for the world to see and criticise. And it has to be final!! Argh! But it’s not yet good enough! Perhaps it will never be good enough! OMG it is never going to be good enough! Cue imposter syndrome and full-blown thesis anxiety.
The fear that accompanies writing and research can be paralysing. We have a tendency to take it personally. To think it should be easier. Perhaps we have these feelings because we are no good at this! Perhaps we are not cut out for academia, after all, and everyone is going to find out. The idea that research is hard is quite accepted, but we often don’t know how to deal with the fear and low feelings that may come with it. It is important to see it for what it is: something that is par for the course. It isn’t personal.That realisation, that it’s not you (it is not you!) is important. My friend hadn’t suddenly become less competent. All that happened is she had become scared.
Setting attainable goals
When fear soars, there are ways to work with it. To not become paralysed by it.
Acknowledging the fear and being self-compassionate is the best place to start. It is normal and OK to have these feelings when writing a PhD. It says nothing about your capability or the quality of your work. Moreover, you can have these feelings and do good work.
Lowering your expectations is what, counter-intuitively, works. To understand why, it is useful to know that such fears are lurking perfectionism expressing itself. Perfection is an unattainable goal. No wonder it scares us: we will fail, for sure.
Yet what if we set an attainable goal?
It is this simple trick that works: make it doable. And sometimes, when we are really stuck that attainable goal may be to write a single paragraph, or to write for ten minutes. It doesn’t matter.
All that matters is to break the self-defeating circle of fear and paralysis and self-blame. You do it by writing a paragraph at a time (or whatever length of text or time is feasible), and acknowledging your effort and your progress. Keep going!
Engage with your work, not your fears
Perfectionism is about how we think we will be perceived, not so much about the work itself. It helps to make it less about you and your perceived failing. Make it more about curiosity. What are you trying to do and say in this paragraph? Engage with your work, not with your fears.
One paragraph at a time is doable. One work session at a time is doable.
It may still be slow. You may still have doubts. But it is doable.
When you are stuck due to fear and paralysis, it helps to shorten your work sessions. Anything to chop the task ahead into smaller steps. Adapt your work schedule, and go step by step, taking good care of yourself along the way. At some point you will find that fear lessens its grip, simply because you are making progress. Keep reinforcing this positive circle: set an attainable goal, achieve the attainable goal, congratulate yourself with achieving the goal (even if it feels minute, like writing a single paragraph).
One of the reasons my PhD came together relatively quickly in the end is that I made a decision to engage with my fears as little as possible. I wasn’t perfect by any stretch of the imagination, but every time fear and perfectionist thoughts came up I reminded myself they were only making my work more difficult, complicating life unnecessarily. In a way the fact that I was in serious trouble in other areas of my life (pesky health situation), made it easier. I was not going to waste an ounce of energy on self-destructive thoughts. Not if I could help it! I needed the scarce energy I had to do something constructive. So I kept going, one paragraph at a time. It is what made all the difference.
Assignment
Keep it small. How could you keep it small? Could you shorten your work sessions? (I have one friend who finished her PhD in 10 minute increments. True!) Could you break your next task down into tiny doable steps? Can you do one of those steps? And be pleased you did it? Keep going, you can do it!