How to Make Peace With Your Internal Editor (And Whether or Not You Should)

At Academic Ladder, we emphasize the importance of identifying negative self-talk when it arises during a writing session and silencing overly critical inner voices.  We talk about replacing the negative self-statements with positive ones, and re-framing what our internal editors are saying.  This is especially important to do when writing a first draft, or when freewriting, because stopping every few words to edit is neither efficient nor effective.

But what if it's hard to speak back to those negative voices because deep down in your gut you really believe they're right?  What if there's some truth to what your inner critic is saying?  This is a hard one, because sometimes it's difficult to separate the negativity and criticism that comes from fear or pain from the more protective voices of caution.  There are times when it may be necessary to listen to those cautionary voices rather than shut them out entirely.

For instance, when I sat down to write this blog post, I began questioning everything from the use of the parenthetical phrase in the title to my choice of the word "emphasize."  I was also thinking about whether or not this topic would be too heavy for a blog post, and whether or not I even wanted to suggest writers should make peace with their internal editors, especially while writing.  In the end, I decided  that there is a strange balance between silencing and acknowledging our internal editors, and that finding that balance is really key in order to make progress.

There are ways to tell the difference between a critical voice that's helpful and one that's callously destructive.  First, ask yourself where and maybe even whom the voice is coming from.  If the statement is harsh and general, chances are the words may not even be your own.  Maybe you've internalized the opinions of an overly critical parent or teacher, or maybe the statement is emblematic of the toxic nature of your academic environment.  Statements like "This is never going to work," or "You are lazy," or "You are not good enough/smart enough to do this" are most likely not coming from you, but from someone else.  Sometimes it's good to figure out from whom.

Another question to ask yourself is "what will listening to this statement serve?"  If the answer is "nothing," then that's definitely a voice not worth listening to.  On the other hand, if listening to the statement will be productive, that might be a voice worth considering, just not right then.   You can make a note in the draft to come back to that point and and think about it later, after you've gotten the day's writing done.

Finally, there are some voices we must not ignore.  These are the voices that say things like "I can't keep going on like this," or "I am burning out," or "I am pushing myself beyond my limits."  Pushing yourself can be good, but at a certain point, especially if you've been at the writing for awhile during a given session, this may be your internal protective voice kicking in and saying "Listen, you've had enough.  It's time for a break."

The more self-aware you are during this process, the more you'll be able to tell the difference between the internal editor you need to listen to and the ones you need to edit out.  Not all negative voices are harmful, just as not all positive voices are helpful.  As you practice daily or near-daily writing habits, you'll start to learn how to tell the difference, and how and when to listen to the voices that have your back.

3 Secrets to Doing Well this Summer, Even if You’re an Academic

Ah, Summer! At last, many of us academics have the promise of unstructured time……… and the peril of unmet goals.

Yes, we were often the children who loved school. After all, we kept on going for years! Yet we treasured summer vacation for its slower pace, tempting activities, exciting adventures, idle laziness.

Summer in an academic life holds such promise! Many of us have put off all of our writing goals until this magic season. We anticipate:

• Fewer external commitments!
• The chance to structure the days as you wish!
• Extended time in library or lab!
• You can finally get that project fully under way!
• Opportunities for projects!
• Time with friends and family!
• Vacation! Travel to family or exotic locales!

But summer brings perils as well. Summer break for an academic writer is not the same today as those glorious memories of childhood summer vacations.

The promise of limitless time to accomplish our greatest dreams often is not fulfilled.

What happens? And what can you do about it?

The following simple tips will help you enjoy your summer while remaining productive. You’ll thank yourself in September for giving some thought to summer writing.

• Family responsibilities. They don’t vanish, and they may become more challenging during school vacation.
• Backlog of chores. Clean your office, clean your house, finish that report…. Your own list is even longer.
• Impossible ambition. Your writing goals, unfettered by teaching or administrative responsibilities, grow huge.
• Isolation from colleagues and even your advisor. Yes, the quiet is great, but it can be hard to keep moving forward without familiar cues. When you are stuck, there may be no one next door to bounce an idea off.
• Time slips away. The most terrifying peril of summer. What stretches endlessly in May can become panic in July.

But you can achieve the promise of summer! You can avoid its perils! You can make this summer the very best ever. Here are the “Three Secrets for Doing Well This Summer, Even if You are an Academic”, which summarize much of what we’ve written about in the Academic Ladder Newsletter for the past seven years.

Secret #1:  Write Well (Write the right way, not “write beautifully”)

• Write every weekday. This is a basic tenet of The Academic Writing Club. Why?
• Daily writing is successful. Professional writers write every day. Research on successful academic writers finds that they write every day.
• Daily writing keeps your project fresh in your mind. You start where you left off, mid sentence or with a note about your next step.
• Daily writing adds up.
• Write in brief sessions. Finally, you do not have to squeeze writing sessions into those bits of time between responsibilities. But brief is better.
• Often find 25-minute sessions, with 5-minute breaks, work well. You may prefer to work in 15-minute sessions, or you may be able to focus for 45.
• Have more time? Write in more sessions! But keep each session brief.
• Take a break every week. And remember, a planned day off is MUCH more effective respite than a day where you planned to write but just procrastinated for 8 hours. Whether it is a mini-vacation or a routine weekend, days off are refreshing and rejuvenating.
• Record time and progress.
• Log how many minutes spent writing and reading/researching.
• It’s fun sometimes to graph your progress and see those hours add up!
• Include at least 2 types of academic work and one non-writing activity each day.
• Your writing goals include both focused, intense, concentrated work and tasks that are more routine. Keep them both moving forward, for better variety and choices.
• Apply the principle of “brief, regular sessions” to those non-writing tasks that have accumulated. Devote one session each day to cleaning your work environment, or learning new software, or exploring scholarly resources. 
• Not everyone can work on multiple projects at once. You may need to work on two projects on alternate days. An important key.

Secret #2: Plan Well

• Plan your writing success. Start with the end of the summer and chart realistic goals backwards to your official beginning date.
• Try a planning tool, like a workbook with weekly assignments. Ones we like include
• Writing Your Journal Article in Twelve Weeks by Wendy Laura Belcher
• Demystifying Dissertation Writing: A Streamlined Process from Choice of Topic to Final Text by Peg Boyle Single
• Plan for Fall. Yes, it is only May. But the time does creep up. Something will face you at the end of the summer: course preparation, a big file, job search materials.
• Designate time for fall preparation. Plan it the way that is best for you: do a bit each day, or get it over with now, or put it off until a particular date. What matters is that you are intentional.

Secret #3: Live Well

• Stay connected as you write. Build a writing group with colleagues; plan coffee dates for side-by-side writing; recruit an accountability partner.
• Take an authentic vacation. Academic work can be flexible. Too often, that leads you to feel that work hangs over you all the time. You need time off.
• Build balance. Just as it is important to include self-care and family/friend priorities during intensely scheduled times, it is important to stay in touch with your scholarly self when the balance shifts.

This will be the best summer ever! You can meet its promise and avoid its perils!

Please comment below with any tricks that you have that make the summer (or any unscheduled free time) work well for you.

*with apologies to our many members in the Southern Hemisphere, and thanks for your routine translation of seasonal comments

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Resources:

From our friend Kerry Ann Rockquemore, President and CEO of the National Center for Faculty Development and Diversity, A series of columns in Inside Higher Ed during summer 2010:
http://www.insidehighered.com/advice/summer/summer1

Single, Peg Boyle, Demystifying Dissertation Writing: A Streamlined Process from Choice of Topic to Final Text, Stylus, 2009
http://stylus.styluspub.com/Books/BookDetail.aspx?productID=182911

Belcher, Wendy Laura, Writing Your Journal Article in Twelve Weeks:A Guide to Academic Publishing Success, Sage Publications. 2009.
http://www.sagepub.com/books/Book231055

Summertime, and the Living is Easy--Or Not

Ahhhhhhh, summer.   If you're like most academics this time of year, you're breathing a huge sigh of relief.  You've turned in your grades, you've finished TAing that horrible class that took all of your time, and your department is winding down its endless meetings.  Now you can get down to your own writing, right?  You can finally work on your own work that you've been putting off because you had to get those papers graded and go over all those tests.

Well, yes and no.  If you've been teaching this academic year and have minimal teaching and administrative responsibilities this summer, then yes, you will have a great deal more time.  But what you probably won't have is a lot more energy.  In fact, you'll probably be a bit burned out, or experiencing some version of Academic Exhaustion syndrome.  In that case, seriously consider taking some sort of break to mark the end of the term.  Go away for a long weekend, or even (gasp!) a week, and use that time to regroup and recharge so that you can come back refreshed and ready to work.

Then, when you come back (or maybe even before you leave), make a plan for what you want to accomplish this summer and how you want to handle it.  Be sure that plan is realistic, and that you're not trying to cram twelve months worth of writing and research into three months.  Find out what your optimal length writing session is and how many separate sessions you can productively fit into a day.  If you find that your attention wanes after 45 or 50 minutes, there's no point trying to work for an hour and a half or two hours.  Likewise, if you find that you can fit in several 25 or 30 minute sessions, make sure that you're not planning for too many in a row.  Break up your day with other activities.  Allow yourself to have breaks.  If you are the kind of person who works well working straight through, then go ahead and plan for your two or three hours, but then carefully monitor your energy levels.  As Eviatar Zerubavel says in The Clockwork Muse, if you go over your optimal length writing session, you may just experience diminishing returns.  Be aware of that possibility and plan preemptive strategies to circumvent it.

The summer is a great opportunity to get work done, and many academics flourish during it.  But don't get caught up in the trap of thinking that because you have "all this time" that you are required to use every second of it.  Think about what is realistic and what is going to help you make the most advantage of your time.  Make sure your summer writing goals aren't so large that you're just going to frustrate yourself.  And remember that the same strategies that work for squeezing in the writing during the academic year can often be employed in the summer as well.  It's really the flip-side of the same problem; either way, you're faced with the challenge of managing your energy as well as your time.

What are your goals for the summer?  And do you have any particular tips or strategies to help other academics handle the summer paradox of "too much time?"

Stop What You're Doing and Breathe

It may seem counterintuitive to take time out to relax or meditate at this point in the academic year, but it's during these chaotic times when we most need to schedule in time for a break, even if it's just for a few minutes.  If the weather is nice where you are, try getting outside and taking a walk, or even just standing outside and breathing deeply for five minutes.  You can also sit in a rocking chair and rock, lie down on your back on the floor, or simply sit at your desk and close your eyes and count slowly from one to five.

For a little aided meditation, there are several web environments dedicated to providing relaxing sounds and images.  You may want to try http://www.calm.com/, which simply lets you into a quiet scene and stay there.  If you press start, there will be a slow voice giving you directions, but you don't have to press start. You can just sit and breathe and watch the scene.  You can also click on "no guidance," which will turn on quiet music in the background, and make the directions window disappear.

What do you do at this time of the academic year for a break?  And what ends up happening if you don't take one?    Whatever your answers are, I hope you manage to stop between work sessions and find a few moments of peace.

Academia and Achievements: Why is it So Hard for Us to Give Ourselves Rewards?

A few days ago, Academic Ladder coach Susanne Morgan wrote an excellent article about the need for writers to create habits, and in particular, to follow a system in which we first give ourselves cues to write, secondly write, and finally, after we've finished our writing session, we give ourselves rewards.  This is a great way to build a consistent writing habit, and rewards, both internal and external, are a big part of Academic Ladder's philosophy.  But if rewards are so important, then why are we so reluctant to give them to ourselves?  Many of the writing participants I work with have admitted to struggling with this concept, and  I often struggle with it too.

For many of us, it comes down to the culture of academia and the value that the academy places on product versus process.  Most of us have spent a long time in a culture where the amount of work we do is never valued or acknowledged; what matters is the end result.  Our dissertation chairs don't really care how hard or how long we've worked on writing those chapters; in the end, they just want to see words on the page. Likewise, when we prepare our dossiers for reappointment or to go up for tenure, we are constantly told to explain what we've done and have some tangible result to point to.  Publications matter, and to some degree student evaluations, but no one is going to value the hours or smaller tasks it took to achieve these results.

This is why we have to be our own auditors in a way, and we have to be very kind to ourselves in doing so.  When we complete our writing for the day, we need to spend some time acknowledging what we have done rather than beating ourselves up for what we didn't do.  It helps to have realistic goals that we can achieve, because then we're going to be more likely to meet the goal, and therefore to believe we deserve the corresponding reward.  It also helps, as one writing participant has suggested, to map out the rewards ahead of time, so that you know going into the writing session what the reward will be, and therefore will be more likely to want to work towards it.

Another way to look at this is instead of viewing the rewards as rewards, to view them as what one writing club participant calls "balancing activities," activities that will provide a balance to the intense, often mentally draining work of academic writing.  This way, even if you don't quite meet that day's goal, you can still participate in the balancing activity.  This is extremely important if you are giving yourself a walk or a physical activity as a reward.  So then if you fall slightly short of your goal, should you not work out?  Of course not!  Make sure that you are still taking care of yourself in the middle of all of this.  And continue to look back at your writing sessions and check for the times that you've been unrealistic or overly ambitious in your plan for the day or the week.  Remember to choose small, achievable goals rather than setting your sights on your own personal Everests that you may or may not be able to achieve.  You can certainly have those Everests, but remember that you won't climb the mountain all at once!  And valuing each step along the way has its merits.

What about you?  What rewards do you give yourself?  How do you work past the feeling that you don't deserve the reward?

Task Mapping and Time Management for Academics

Last week we talked about goal setting and defining tasks. Since this is a challenging topic for most of us, I thought I'd break it down a little more. The idea of task mapping comes from business, but we can apply it directly to our academic writing tasks. The general idea is that you select a very defined segment of time and then think about what task or micro-task you can do within it.

The beauty of this approach is that by focusing in on one tiny task per half an hour or 45 minute session, you minimize the anxiety surrounding the enormity of the task at large. Chances are that you decided to do academic work because your mind likes to solve problems. Put that strength to work by giving it lots of little, defined, workable problems, rather than a nebulous general to do list.

For instance, instead of 2:00 – 4:00 p.m. “Work on chapter 3” or even “Work on chapter 3, section x”, try really mapping out your time:

• 2:00 – 2:45: Draft two paragraphs on the effectiveness of small tutorials in writing classes
• 2:45 – 3:00: Break (Get up and stretch and walk around the room—don’t check email!)
• 3:00 – 3:45: Draft two more paragraphs on the effectiveness of small tutorials in writing classes
• 3:45 – 4:00: Break and write down action steps for the next day’s work

If you like to work in pomodoros (segments of 25-30 minutes), you could try breaking it down even further:

• 2:00 – 2:25: Write 50-100 words on the effectiveness of small tutorials in writing classes
• 2:25 – 3:00: Break (Get up and stretch—get a quick beverage, no email!)
• 3:00 – 3:25: Find reference for effectiveness of small tutorials in writing classes and see how it fits into the section

If you don’t have drafting tasks that day, you can still use this approach for your other dissertation related work. So instead of “draft one paragraph of Chapter 3, section I,” maybe your task will be “Read article x and take notes” or “Read article y and see how it fits into the introduction of Chapter 2.” Or “Address adviser comments on Chapter 3, pages 1-3.” See how specific these tasks are?

If this is too micromanaging for you, you can try being a little looser and more freeform (like Benjamin Franklin with his schedule in the image above), but at least try doing the micromanaging approach for a couple of sessions just to see how it works. You might find that it feels more comfortable that it sounds, and that you get a lot more done.

How to Define and Schedule Academic Tasks

On Monday, I talked about the weight of unfinished tasks, and how important it is to set daily, achievable goals, but many of us have trouble with that. Particularly if we are in the social sciences or humanities, we tend to have difficulty breaking down our larger projects into smaller, discrete tasks. We also tend to underestimate vastly the length of time it takes to do a particular task.

So how do we get realistic? How do we set those smaller, more achievable goals? 

The best way is to be as specific as possible with what you want to accomplish during a given session. For instance, at the broadest level, a task might be "work on paper" or "work on dissertation," but generally, that won't work too well. If we say "tomorrow I'm going to do something. Anything," it might work, but we'll have a much better chance of actually accomplishing the goal if we say something like "From 8:30 - 9:00 a.m., I will expand the introductory paragraph of chapter 2" or "from 9:00 - 9:45 p.m., I will begin outlining the section on Piaget's influence on early childhood development."

But what if you don't know enough about your daily schedule to be able to set a specific time to work? What if you haven't looked at a section in a long time and you don't know enough to be able to break it down into a set of micro-tasks? In that case, it's probably good to specify at least a range of hours when you think you'll be working, and still define the amount of time you can work. Frankly, it's not as good as making that concrete appointment with yourself, but it's better than just saying you're going to work on it "tomorrow." And if you don't know enough about the section you're writing to be able to break it down, then make your first session back into it be a brainstorming session, during which you make a list of the tasks you know you'll need to accomplish in order to complete the section. Then at the end of that writing session, you can choose what tasks to schedule next.

Now you tell me--what helps you get and stay motivated to keep writing? And how do you set your own goals and define your tasks?