My done-diary
In the post back in January about ‘Not forgetting everything you did last year’ I talked about a new done notebook strategy. Four months later, this is a quick update on how I’m using it right now.
In the post back in January about ‘Not forgetting everything you did last year’ I talked about a new done notebook strategy. Four months later, this is a quick update on how I’m using it right now.
So one issue with trying to take a break is that we get so much advice on how to work and very little realistic advice on what to do when we rest. Most rest advice that we do get, is aspirational. Here’s my regular, realistic insider’s view.
Not only is Writing Well and Being Well for your PhD and Beyond now in to my publishers, but we have a publication date and a preorder link.
Subjectively, the final stages of a writing project often feel the most ‘stuck’, boring and slow. Why is that, when objectively they are often the opposite?
I recently re-read Cal Newport’s Deep Work in preparation for my new book on writing and wellbeing. And soon enough I started to notice that the people he uses as exemplars of doing deep work were … all pretty similar. By my reading, there are only two women in the book who are described as doing deep thinking. And yet, perhaps, ladies* would still like to do deep work.
Here is a list of 12 writing gifts to give the writer in your life this Christmas. (The writer is you).
But then I turned the page of my done-dairy, and … there were two entries for August. One said “Lockdown 6.0” and one said “Curfew”. And that was the end of my diary.
With major strides forward in AI (artificial intelligence/machine learning), computers are increasingly able to produce music, images and text. So you might wonder if soon we’ll have an AI that can write your PhD for you.
Last weekend, the blog underwent a serious overhaul, with a new look, new design, updated content and a sign-up for a newsletter if you want even more from Research Degree Insiders! I’m really lucky to have worked with Dr Bronwyn Eager of Ivory Tower who did all the design and technical work. This post tells you about Ivy Tower, about Bronwyn, and about our design process. As always, it’s about the insider tips!
So often academic reading is experienced as a chore, or an anxiety, or an extractive industry. You might skim, mine or categorise your reading. You might read to critique, to look for the gaps. Perhaps you are looking forward to the day when machine learning tools can do your reading for you. Perhaps you would like to keep up with the wider reading in your field, but don’t feel like you have time. All of these mean that we often have a fraught relationship with reading.
