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Is Time Your Enemy? Conquer Time with an "Unschedule"!

Time can be your friend or your enemy. For many academics, it is a merciless tyrant. Academia can provide the luxury of not having to punch a clock. Unfortunately, this luxury makes it easy to allow that all-important project (usually writing, hereafter referred to as the Project) to slide, as you fill in your day with the humdrum and the emergencies.

The Enemy You Don't Know CAN Hurt You

In Procrastination: Why You Do It; What to Do About It by Jane Burka and Lenor Yuen, the authors suggest that procrastinators (which I'm convinced means most of us) have a strange relationship with time. They engage in "wishful thinking" -- they believe that they can magically pull and stretch time to meet their needs. They act as if time is not finite and limited.

So if time perpetually controls you, it may be because you don't understand it. You either think that:

• Small tasks will be endless (so you put off doing them)

• Big tasks will just take an hour or two (so you don't leave enough time for them.)

As a matter of fact, academics tend to overestimate how much time they have actually spent on their most important task, writing.

Another reason time controls you, according to Burka and Yuen, is that you have no idea how much time you're already spending on tasks such as commuting, shopping, cooking or emailing. Therefore it's a mystery how much free time is available for the difficult yet easy-to-put-off tasks, such as writing.

Or maybe you've voluntarily overscheduled yourself due to your "endlessly-expanding" view of time. Little by little you've used up your free time.

On the other end of the continuum are people with a lot of discretionary time. Some academics decide that they will spend all their free time on vacation working on their dissertation or publication. Graduate students take time off of teaching to write, and professors take sabbaticals or even unpaid time just to get writing time. Then all that unscheduled time increases their anxiety and makes them even less efficient!

The Unschedule

How can you tame time?

Enter the "Unschedule." The Unschedule is a time management tool developed by Neil Fiore, the author of The Now Habit.

For your convenience, I have created an Unschedule in PDF format that you can download from this link: http://www.tinyurl.com/Unschedule

Here are the rules to make the Unschedule work for you:

• Use a pencil (my rule) to allow changes
• Write down everything you must do in the coming week, NOT including your Project. Include everything; meals, sleep, commuting, appointments, and classes
• Estimate when and how long each will take and mark it in your Unschedule on the hours you most likely will do each activity
• Include recreation, leisure and social activities (crucial!)
• Look at your Unschedule at this point to become aware of How much unscheduled time is actually available
• What's missing from your life – do you have enough time for fun, socializing, and just decompressing?
• As the week progresses, each time that you work on your Project for at least 30 minutes (Fiore insists on 30, but in our Writing Club we preach that 15 is enough, and that's been proven true, time and time again by our members), mark it in your Unschedule. Remember, you don't mark it in ahead of time. It works best if you can highlight those time blocks in color. You can then total the amount of time spent working towards your goal at the end of each day and week.

Why Fill In the Time Blocks AFTER You Work on Your Project?

This accomplishes several things:

• You avoid being disappointed in yourself (as you may have in the past because you scheduled so much Project time and then let yourself down by not accomplishing the work.)
• If you have a rebellious streak, you will not having anything to rebel against, since you haven't filled in the times you MUST work ahead of time
• You will feel good about what you HAVE done as opposed to bad about what you haven't done
• You will be reminded to reward yourself by switching to a more enjoyable activity
• You will more easily be able to track how much you have actually worked on your project each week, as opposed to how much time you wished you would work on your project.
• You will prove to yourself that small blocks of time DO add up, and are worth doing.
• You can look for patterns – e.g., discover your best work times or days

If working with a schedule hasn't worked for you, if you recognize that you have a distorted relationship with time, or if you're just a garden-variety academic procrastinator, then the Unschedule may be for you. Try it!

And if you'd like more writing tips and the support that you deserve, join us in The Academic Writing Club.

Visit us right now, check out what we have to offer, and sign up -- don't let another deadline slip by! http://www.academicwritingclub.com

What is your WORD for 2010?

I don't know about you, but 2009 was a very tough year for me. I'm glad to kiss it goodbye and welcome the New Year/New Decade.

In that spirit, here's a post from Jayne London, my Associate Coach and the Manager of the Academic Writing Club. This letter was sent to members of the Writing Club, but I thought I'd make it available to all.

Happy New Year! Wow --- 2010! It's time to turn a new page on a new decade. This is an opportunity that won't come along again for another 10 years. Imagine back to 2000 and what you thought you would be doing 10 years later.

I hope you can acknowledge all your accomplishments from the past 10 years and enjoy that feeling in the days to come.

There will be many opportunities for you in this new decade. Are you ready for them?

For this upcoming year, a simple but powerful suggestion was offered by a graduate student in the Writing Club. She calls it ONE LITTLE WORD TO LIVE WITH.

She wrote: "About this time last year, a friend of mine challenged me (and others) to choose a word to “live with” for the coming year (2009). She got the idea from a scrapbooking website (http://onelittleword.typepad.com/). As a middle-aged, dissertating woman with lots of life distractions, I have no time nor energy for scrapbooking, but decided I could choose a word, put it on my desk, and think of ways to let that word inspire me – much easier than writing New Year’s resolutions that I wouldn’t keep! My word for 2009 was HOPE. I found lots of ways to live in hope, and the reminder was helpful during some very difficult struggles – with my dissertation, my committee, my health, and some difficult losses."
==================

My “word” for 2010 will be "SMILE." (I love feeling that positive surge of energy and happiness when I smile. I love to smile, and want to more of it, and make others smile as well.)

I challenge you to think of a word, keep it near you each day, and see if it makes a difference for you in 2010. Please post your WORD on the Message Board so we can know what you're focusing on during this new year.

Here are some ideas that came from my fellow coaches:
CREATE PATIENCE ORGANIZE RELEVANCE

Happy New Year!

Jayne

And I wish all of you a Happy New Year, too. I think my word will be REBIRTH.

If you're not in the Writing Club, please post your WORD here. I'd love to hear your thoughts.

Waiting for your dissertation advisor's feedback

I like to ask people who sign up for the "Dissertation Writer's Toolkit" what the biggest challenge is in writing their dissertation. Here is what one wise responder wrote:

Feedback. Writing something, say a chapter, and getting feedback from the supervisor on it. Somehow it always goes on the 'to do' pile ....and you wait and wait. I found it was much more helpful to agree to a deadline, and push push push (in a nice way) to have my supervisor look at it. It doesn't work long distance; you have to be right under their noses and booked on an airplane and out again 10 weeks later. Somehow the whole thing will be done, written, corrected and finished in that time. Worked for me.

Sometimes students are just too 'in awe' of their supervisors to expect action, and politely sit back and wait for the feedback. I have friends who waited 6 months for chapters to be returned. I waited too long, too (I was 20,000 km away), then I just got fed up, shipped the kids off to Grandma and got on a plane.

I'm very much in agreement with this writer. Professors are human; they sometimes need deadlines, they often operate in "overwhelm mode." So especially if you are writing your dissertation long-distance, consider the airplane and grandma method that is recommended here.

A New Year's Toast (that fits my life)

This is from Louis Schmier, professor and philosophizer extraordinaire. He describes how he will toast the new year. (To read his whole blog post, go here.)

"I'll pour a quiet glass of champagne then or on 2010 January's first day and lift it to this coming year's surprises, to all the coming unawares, to the inevitable reshuffling of the deck, to the complexity of it all, to what I cannot now know, to what I cannot now guess, to what I have no clue, to what I cannot now control, to what I cannot now guarantee, to the out-of-the-blue bolt of lightning, to the unpredicted, to the unexpected, to the unfamiliar, to the without warning, to the out of nowhere, to the unforeseen, to never stepping into either the same river or class, to all the twists and turns in life's road that will keep me from falling asleep at the wheel, to the unplanned interruptions that like an earthquake will shake me from the doldrums of routine, to the as yet unknown challenges that will keep me from atrophying, and to the unanticipated adventures that will keep me questing for truer answers."

Later in his post, he goes on to say:

"But, as M. Scott Peck had once said, our shining moments are more likely to occur when we are deeply shaken from our smug comfort and complacency. After all, what else but "new" can teach me lessons from the rich experiences of everyday life, pose alternatives thoughts and feelings and actions, alter courses, transform hopelessness into hopeful, disbelief into belief, resignation into expectation, an ugly "ugh" into a beautiful "wow, "blah into spirited, unhappiness into bliss, dream into real, plod into dance, "no" into a "yes," numbness into aware, pessimism into optimism, and callousness into love? What else would keep me better focused on and moving towards my vision, as well as working my way there? What else would offer me a tool to avert being hypnotized into sleep walking into class and teaching in my sleep? What else would stimulate my mind, heart, and soul? What else would keep every fiber of my being on full alert? What else would rouse my curiosity? What else would fuel my imagination and creativity? What else would give me the chance to sow, blossom, and ripen? What else would give me an opening to become a better person? What other occasions would be as exciting, adventurous, enriching, satisfying, meaningful, and significant?"

So, will you raise your glass with me? Here's to the wondrous blessings of discomforting serendipity in the coming New Year! See you and talk to you all in 2010! May you each be joyful and blessed in the inevitable coming unknowns of the New Year!!"

In case you follow the writing plan from the previous post...

In case you decide to follow the options in the writing plan in my previous post, I wanted to remind you that we now have gift certificates to the Academic Writing Club. Ask for membership to the Club as a holiday gift, and get something you really need, for a change. The Club will help you implement your writing plan on a daily basis.

Or maybe some nice dissertation advisor or department chair will realize that the Academic Writing Club will increase their graduation rate and decrease time to degree, and give all the graduate students a gift. Well, I can dream, can't I?

The Academic Writing Club Gift Certificate!
Give the gift of peace of mind . . .

Now you can give (or ask those who love you to give you) a gift certificate to the Academic Writing Club. You can give 1, 4, or 12 sessions, each consisting of 4 weeks of membership in the Academic Writing Club.

To learn more, go to (or tell your loved ones to go to): http://writinggift.notlong.com

Or print out and give this hint page (a pdf) to someone who loves you!

Write or Rest During Your Break? Here’s a Plan!

Aaah – The holiday break. For those of us in the Northern Hemisphere, it’s time to sail away to an exotic location*, or more likely to collapse and then visit relatives.

But many academics are torn about whether and how much to write during the holidays. On the one hand, they’re exhausted from the semester, and need a rest. They want to spend time with family and friends. Yet they know that the holiday break may be the best time to get some writing done.

As usual, I’m talking about the long-term writing projects that must be done in order to advance your career – either finishing your dissertation or writing articles/books towards tenure or promotion. These are the projects that get pushed to the back burner because their completion really only matters to you.

Write or Rest -- How about a Compromise?

Which should you do during your break -- write or rest? Well, here’s a compromise plan (with a 9-step or 10-step option) that has worked for many people.

1. Give yourself some time off. There’s no point in being unrealistic and deciding to force yourself to work when you’re exhausted, unless you have a grant proposal deadline or something of the sort. The reason for not forcing yourself is that no matter what you decide to do, you probably won’t do it, and then you won’t fully enjoy your time off because of the guilt.
2. Decide several days ahead of time on which day you’re going to start writing, and put that in your calendar. You can also decide which days you will and won’t work and write those days down. By doing this, you will be more likely to bypass the repeating “I’ll start tomorrow” syndrome.
3. While you’re at it, if you can stand this degree of regimentation, write down what time you’re going to write each day. In general, especially if you’re staying with family or friends, first thing in the morning works the best, for two reasons. First, you’re more likely to actually do it, before other interesting distractions come your way. Two, you won’t spend all day dreading and avoiding the writing time that is waiting for you. For some people, there is a third reason – you may work best in the morning. If only that were true for me.
4. Decide how much time to spend writing each day. This is the biggie -- it will determine your success in following through on the entire plan. Note: When I discuss writing in this context, I’m referring only to writing, editing, revising, or in some cases, statistical analysis. I’m not referring to time spent reading and researching. Those are necessary tasks, but people do not tend to avoid them as they do the actual writing. Hence this plan.
   

Before I suggest what to do in this step, I’d like to explain why this is so important.

If you’re like some people who have long days of vacation ahead of them and who want to accomplish a lot, you will eagerly say to yourself, “I’ll have all day, so I’ll plan on 3 solid hours of writing in the morning and 4 hours in the afternoon.” Here’s what happens to the majority of these people:

They spend miserable days staring at their computer, with long “warm-ups” of checking emails, reading their favorite political bloggers, or looking up Britney Spears’ latest weight, followed by anxious staring at a blank page, followed by a break involving checking emails, writing emails, and playing computer Scrabble (yes, that’s my latest – there’s an app for that).

They can’t believe at the end of a long day how little they actually wrote, if anything. After a couple of days of this, they give up on writing during their break. This is not a conscious decision, but one that is made by default, gradually, as they find a “good reason” each day that they can’t work that day.

They do not enjoy their holiday break at all, because they know at the bottom of their heart that they are making a big mistake by not writing. At the end of the break they are completely guilt-ridden, panicked and mortified that they have accomplished nothing.

How do you avoid this terrible fate when carrying out your own writing plan? There are two options here, and which option you follow depends mostly on how much writing you need to get done.

• Option 1: Follow this option if you have a busy holiday schedule, don’t have a looming deadline, or probably wouldn’t tend to write at all over the holidays without this plan. It also works well if you’ve been blocked.

• Option 2: Follow this option if you either must write a fair amount (based on deadlines, such as grant proposals, book editors demands, or demanding dissertation advisors) or you are the rare bird that can write for more than an hour a day when you don’t have a deadline hanging over your head.

Option 1: Steps

1. Decide the previous day what you will specifically be working on. I’m assuming that you’ve done any reading or research that is needed in order to write the next day. If you haven’t been writing for a while, you might need to get your document ready and open.
2. The previous day would also be a good time to find a timer, either at home or on the Internet.
3. Eliminate all possible distractions or the chance of interruptions (e.g. email program off, sign on door, letting your family know that you won’t be available for the next 15 minutes).
4. Do NOT set a goal of number of pages written, or how much of one section you will finish. Your only goal is to write for a certain number of minutes.
5. Set your timer for 15 minutes.
6. Start writing, (or editing and revising, if you’re in that stage of the project). When the timer goes off, STOP.
7. For many of you, that is all that you will have time for that day. That’s fine. You did more than you would have without this process, and you may have more reading to do to prepare for your next writing session.
   
8. Make sure you write down what to start on tomorrow.
9. If you feel like working a little more, set the timer for a 10 minute break, then repeat steps 1) through 8).
   

Option 2: Steps

• Steps 1) through 4) follow steps for Option 1 above.
• Step 5) Set your timer for any amount of time up to 45 minutes.
• Steps 6) through 9) are the same as for Option 1.
• Step 10) Because you have a looming deadline, you will probably spend more time writing. Always take as refreshing a break as you can – walk, dance, make a snowman. Then after 10-15 minutes you can go back to your writing. Repeat this as often as you can throughout the day. Ideally, you can do 2 or 3 productive writing sessions, then do some reading and preparing for your next writing session, then go off and enjoy your day.

The aim for both of these options is to:

• Have a reasonable, doable, time-oriented writing goal that you won’t put off because it fills you with dread.
• Allow you to accomplish something during the winter break.
• Allow you guilt-free time each day to enjoy with family and friends, or to take a long nap.
• Enjoy your time off!

I hope that with this simple plan, you’ll be able to actually do what seems impossible: get some writing done AND relax, rest, recreate, rejuvenate, and enjoy the break!

Warmly,
Gina

* Digital painting, "Anna Near Naples," by Gina Hiatt © 2009.