I was playing in a rock and roll band for a couple of years recently--from
2005 to 2007.
The guitarist and I did not quite see eye to eye on the purpose of performing. His desire was that even the public performance be all about the music and about creating the music he wanted, the way he wanted. My interest in playing in public is to connect with audience.
I don't think that either of these positions is right or wrong. I think, actually, that we are trying to balance these two. As writers (or as any sort of artist, I think): we have the paired goals of self-expression and sharing.
One thing I'm wondering about: where do the carrots come in?
Is successful connection with an audience a carrot?
I can see answering both ways, but right now I don't think so.
If we are filled with a sense of purpose--a message that we have to get out--whether that is my guitarist's musical vision, or some verbal message--then we are trying to connect with an audience because of what we have inside us--the vision that we are trying to manifest. Our measure of success is how well we have connected with the audience, and yet we are not doing what we are doing for the approval of the audience.
Some rock and roll was really about nothing more than the passion inside and the message expressed. From protest singers to punks to rap, great music arises from a sense of passion and sense of purpose. And audiences connect with that sense of purpose because it seems real.
Academics, of course, don't get to say "we don't give a f--k what anyone else thinks," because they have to please other academics--especially professors. And the outrage that drives punk music isn't so easily passed off in academic circles. But that doesn't mean that it can't be used to direct a project.
One thing about passion is that it can be overwhelming. But if we can ride the edge where we can see both the passion that drives us, and the compromises we make to communicate that passion in the appropriate context, then we can create something special. It's a difficult balance point to find. Emotional content is volatile and dynamic, making finding balance very difficult. Working with strong emotional content means slipping, perhaps, into a sense of being overwhelmed when the emotions run strong, or slipping into a sense of disillusionment at moments the emotions run weak.
Despite this difficulty, I personally wouldn't recommend anything but to seek this place where a sense of purpose and passion drive you. I know that lots of people make their living writing things they don't care about. I know that writing about things that you don't care about strongly is a safe place to write: the material doesn't shift under your grasp in the same way.
I believe that there are times to seek expediency instead of the noblest aims, and I believe that we shouldn't let a dissertation be delayed by an attempt to make it do too much. But I also believe that we should still work with things that we care about.
Saturday, July 19, 2008
Friday, July 18, 2008
Choosing a Focal Point
It's another beautiful day in the San Francisco Bay Area. The sun is shining; it's warm but there's a cool breeze.
Walking out to run some errands I was worrying, however, about what I hadn't done. And then in a moment I reminded myself that it was a beautiful day.
There are advantages about considering the things that we have yet to do. If we can actually do one of the things we hope to do, that's best, but thinking about which things to do is also a good plan. There's plenty there to think about.
There are also advantages to considering the beauty of the moment. I don't think that spending every day frolicking in the sun is necessarily a good long-term strategy, but it has its moments. And from moment to moment we can continue to be aware of the good things we do have around us while we are engaged in other activities.
I'm not sure there are many good reasons to worry about what we haven't done in the past. It's worth understanding how we can do things so as to avoid old mistakes, but to spend time worrying about the past?
We can choose where to direct our attention. This is obvious. We direct our attention to the left then to the right when we prepare to cross a two-way street (assuming people drive on the right side of the road). We direct our attention to each speaker in turn when we converse with a group of friends. But it's not so easy to direct our attention over longer periods or in some stressful situations.
My belief is that we can learn to focus our attention better. I like to practice by trying to remember the positive things, the things to celebrate and the things that I care about.
I'm feeling positively pollyanna-ish, so my readers will have to forgive me.
Walking out to run some errands I was worrying, however, about what I hadn't done. And then in a moment I reminded myself that it was a beautiful day.
There are advantages about considering the things that we have yet to do. If we can actually do one of the things we hope to do, that's best, but thinking about which things to do is also a good plan. There's plenty there to think about.
There are also advantages to considering the beauty of the moment. I don't think that spending every day frolicking in the sun is necessarily a good long-term strategy, but it has its moments. And from moment to moment we can continue to be aware of the good things we do have around us while we are engaged in other activities.
I'm not sure there are many good reasons to worry about what we haven't done in the past. It's worth understanding how we can do things so as to avoid old mistakes, but to spend time worrying about the past?
We can choose where to direct our attention. This is obvious. We direct our attention to the left then to the right when we prepare to cross a two-way street (assuming people drive on the right side of the road). We direct our attention to each speaker in turn when we converse with a group of friends. But it's not so easy to direct our attention over longer periods or in some stressful situations.
My belief is that we can learn to focus our attention better. I like to practice by trying to remember the positive things, the things to celebrate and the things that I care about.
I'm feeling positively pollyanna-ish, so my readers will have to forgive me.
Wednesday, July 16, 2008
Carrots and Sticks (2)
So I got an e-mail:
I understand what you say here, " The point I'm really aiming at is the value of being accountable to yourself rather than to someone else. " Sometimes however I feel motivated by the enthusiasm of others. There are days like today when I just want to ask, "am I on the right track." Of course I'm looking for an affirmative response so if I received the contrary, I might be utterly shattered. But if I can get some dialogue and discussion to affirm that I am on the right track, it helps me keep going just a little longer. I'm still doing the work for myself (I think/hope) but sometimes the energy to go after that carrot does have to do with the support of someone else...don't know if that makes sense, but it's what I thought about when I read...
Answer number 2:
I think that there's a difference between (1) having internal motivation and (2) being motivated by external events. But that doesn't mean that the internal motivation can't be affected by external forces.
I think that internal motivation is a sense of purpose, a sense that you're doing the work for yourself, and not just as make work, but because the work itself is meaningful to you--meaningful as a part of your life and what you want to accomplish with your life. As a result of this sense of purpose, you pursue the work that you do because you see it as integral to getting what you really want in life.
By contrast, I see the carrot and the stick as representing more external motivations: you do something because you hope that people will treat you well, or you do something because you fear they will treat you poorly. The motivation is not in the act itself, but in the attempt to please others--the search for the carrot and to avoid the stick.
Even if you have internal motivation, that doesn't mean that how others treat you will entirely run off you like water. Just because we have a sense of purpose, that doesn't mean that our emotions don't ebb and flow; it doesn't mean that we won't face difficult moments. You may be filled with a sense of self-purpose, but if someone starts yelling at you or telling you that you're stupid, that may still be difficult. It may be difficult because we're just learning to cultivate our sense of purpose. It may be difficult because the person who is berating us is someone we respect. Having someone yell at you is generally difficult, I think, for most people.
Sometimes people will yell at you because they want you to do something other than what you're doing. That's the stick. At such a moment it behooves us to understand the differences between the potential courses of action, so that we can choose something that suits our purposes, not just something that we chose because we wanted to avoid being yelled at. If someone we respect is telling us we're doing something bad it can be particularly difficult because we want to trust ourselves, but also we want to be able to recognize our own fallibility, too--otherwise we become too dogmatic.
The other side of this is positive feedback. You can have a clear sense of purpose and still gain in motivation through contact with the enthusiasm of others. Let's say, hypothetically, you have a project that you believe in for reason A, and you find a person who thinks your project is very cool for reason B. Why shouldn't you gain in motivation from sharing this new perspective and enthusiasm? Or you might find someone else who is excited for the exact same reason as you (or something very close): is there any reason not to gain from their enthusiasm? Of course not. Just because we believe in something, it doesn't mean we can never share in the enthusiasm of others. And to the extent that scholars are generally people trying to share ideas, if you find someone who shares your ideas that in itself is cause for excitement, and if they connect with what you've written that's an indication that your work in succeeding in reaching the kind of people you want it to reach. Clearly that's reason for excitement and a sense of accomplishment. Getting stroked is nice; the question is whether you're chasing the strokes (the carrots) for their own sake or whether they're coming to you because you're doing something you would do anyway.
Imagine a musician. A person who loves to play music, who loves the creation of music and the interaction with the musical instrument. That person can enjoy playing in the solitude of the home. But he may also take his music out in public, and thereby create the possibility of being appreciated by others. Does that mean that he doesn't love the playing for its own sake any longer? The attentive reader will have noted that "Balance" is one of the labels for this post. Realistically, this is another case where it is a matter of finding balance. The musician--and metaphorically all of us--puts extra effort into taking the show on the road, and from that extra effort gets back (or hopes to get back) the appreciation of others and the sense of sharing. If we are grounded in our love of the music and the playing of the music--in our sense of purpose--then mixing that with a desire for appreciation and sharing with others and their encouragement seems like a balanced, human and social thing to do. It is neither kowtowing to the masses, nor is it self-righteous setting oneself apart.
I understand what you say here, " The point I'm really aiming at is the value of being accountable to yourself rather than to someone else. " Sometimes however I feel motivated by the enthusiasm of others. There are days like today when I just want to ask, "am I on the right track." Of course I'm looking for an affirmative response so if I received the contrary, I might be utterly shattered. But if I can get some dialogue and discussion to affirm that I am on the right track, it helps me keep going just a little longer. I'm still doing the work for myself (I think/hope) but sometimes the energy to go after that carrot does have to do with the support of someone else...don't know if that makes sense, but it's what I thought about when I read...
Answer number 2:
I think that there's a difference between (1) having internal motivation and (2) being motivated by external events. But that doesn't mean that the internal motivation can't be affected by external forces.
I think that internal motivation is a sense of purpose, a sense that you're doing the work for yourself, and not just as make work, but because the work itself is meaningful to you--meaningful as a part of your life and what you want to accomplish with your life. As a result of this sense of purpose, you pursue the work that you do because you see it as integral to getting what you really want in life.
By contrast, I see the carrot and the stick as representing more external motivations: you do something because you hope that people will treat you well, or you do something because you fear they will treat you poorly. The motivation is not in the act itself, but in the attempt to please others--the search for the carrot and to avoid the stick.
Even if you have internal motivation, that doesn't mean that how others treat you will entirely run off you like water. Just because we have a sense of purpose, that doesn't mean that our emotions don't ebb and flow; it doesn't mean that we won't face difficult moments. You may be filled with a sense of self-purpose, but if someone starts yelling at you or telling you that you're stupid, that may still be difficult. It may be difficult because we're just learning to cultivate our sense of purpose. It may be difficult because the person who is berating us is someone we respect. Having someone yell at you is generally difficult, I think, for most people.
Sometimes people will yell at you because they want you to do something other than what you're doing. That's the stick. At such a moment it behooves us to understand the differences between the potential courses of action, so that we can choose something that suits our purposes, not just something that we chose because we wanted to avoid being yelled at. If someone we respect is telling us we're doing something bad it can be particularly difficult because we want to trust ourselves, but also we want to be able to recognize our own fallibility, too--otherwise we become too dogmatic.
The other side of this is positive feedback. You can have a clear sense of purpose and still gain in motivation through contact with the enthusiasm of others. Let's say, hypothetically, you have a project that you believe in for reason A, and you find a person who thinks your project is very cool for reason B. Why shouldn't you gain in motivation from sharing this new perspective and enthusiasm? Or you might find someone else who is excited for the exact same reason as you (or something very close): is there any reason not to gain from their enthusiasm? Of course not. Just because we believe in something, it doesn't mean we can never share in the enthusiasm of others. And to the extent that scholars are generally people trying to share ideas, if you find someone who shares your ideas that in itself is cause for excitement, and if they connect with what you've written that's an indication that your work in succeeding in reaching the kind of people you want it to reach. Clearly that's reason for excitement and a sense of accomplishment. Getting stroked is nice; the question is whether you're chasing the strokes (the carrots) for their own sake or whether they're coming to you because you're doing something you would do anyway.
Imagine a musician. A person who loves to play music, who loves the creation of music and the interaction with the musical instrument. That person can enjoy playing in the solitude of the home. But he may also take his music out in public, and thereby create the possibility of being appreciated by others. Does that mean that he doesn't love the playing for its own sake any longer? The attentive reader will have noted that "Balance" is one of the labels for this post. Realistically, this is another case where it is a matter of finding balance. The musician--and metaphorically all of us--puts extra effort into taking the show on the road, and from that extra effort gets back (or hopes to get back) the appreciation of others and the sense of sharing. If we are grounded in our love of the music and the playing of the music--in our sense of purpose--then mixing that with a desire for appreciation and sharing with others and their encouragement seems like a balanced, human and social thing to do. It is neither kowtowing to the masses, nor is it self-righteous setting oneself apart.
Tuesday, July 15, 2008
Carrots and Sticks
So I got an e-mail:
I understand what you say here, " The point I'm really aiming at is the value of being accountable to yourself rather than to someone else. " Sometimes however I feel motivated by the enthusiasm of others. There are days like today when I just want to ask, "am I on the right track." Of course I'm looking for an affirmative response so if I received the contrary, I might be utterly shattered. But if I can get some dialogue and discussion to affirm that I am on the right track, it helps me keep going just a little longer. I'm still doing the work for myself (I think/hope) but sometimes the energy to go after that carrot does have to do with the support of someone else...don't know if that makes sense, but it's what I thought about when I read...
I was wondering about this.
Because, of course I believe in the power of getting encouragement from others and from having your own work appreciated.
Here's answer number 1:
Last night as I wrote about sticks and carrots I was thinking about something I had heard from George Lakoff. I cannot remember what source this material was published in; I remember reading it, but not where; I do remember George discussing it in a lecture. Anyway--sorry for the lack of a real citation--the story is this:
Lakoff (and perhaps a co-author) had analyzed a set of proverbs translated into English. They were looking for metaphorical structures that were repeated in different languages. One proverb--Chinese, I think--was "Cows run with the wind; Horses run against it." In the brief analysis of this proverb Lakoff suggested that proverb favored horses, i.e., one should persevere in the face of difficulty. And so it was published, but according to Lakoff a native speaker of the language whence the proverb came contacted him to say that the proverb in its native language and culture favored cows: one should go with the flow and be wise.
But the way I see it, they're both right. Both the horses and cows are worthy of respect and emulation.
Or, in other words, we need to find a balance between the self-righteous ego-driven sense of purpose and motivation, and the sense that we are connected with a larger whole.
Living in Berkeley, I have had the opportunity to meet some interesting people--people drawn to the city for its intellectualism, and for its radical reputation; people who are passionate about their causes that they have researched extensively. But I can see these people--they're all preachers of their own little religion in a way--and they are so far removed from what other people are seeing and thinking that they have trouble connecting. I respect their intelligence and their passion for their cause. But there's a part of me that says: "I'm a writer; if I'm writing to share my ideas, then I need to understand how to connect with the people around me."
Answer number 2 is forthcoming.
I understand what you say here, " The point I'm really aiming at is the value of being accountable to yourself rather than to someone else. " Sometimes however I feel motivated by the enthusiasm of others. There are days like today when I just want to ask, "am I on the right track." Of course I'm looking for an affirmative response so if I received the contrary, I might be utterly shattered. But if I can get some dialogue and discussion to affirm that I am on the right track, it helps me keep going just a little longer. I'm still doing the work for myself (I think/hope) but sometimes the energy to go after that carrot does have to do with the support of someone else...don't know if that makes sense, but it's what I thought about when I read...
I was wondering about this.
Because, of course I believe in the power of getting encouragement from others and from having your own work appreciated.
Here's answer number 1:
Last night as I wrote about sticks and carrots I was thinking about something I had heard from George Lakoff. I cannot remember what source this material was published in; I remember reading it, but not where; I do remember George discussing it in a lecture. Anyway--sorry for the lack of a real citation--the story is this:
Lakoff (and perhaps a co-author) had analyzed a set of proverbs translated into English. They were looking for metaphorical structures that were repeated in different languages. One proverb--Chinese, I think--was "Cows run with the wind; Horses run against it." In the brief analysis of this proverb Lakoff suggested that proverb favored horses, i.e., one should persevere in the face of difficulty. And so it was published, but according to Lakoff a native speaker of the language whence the proverb came contacted him to say that the proverb in its native language and culture favored cows: one should go with the flow and be wise.
But the way I see it, they're both right. Both the horses and cows are worthy of respect and emulation.
Or, in other words, we need to find a balance between the self-righteous ego-driven sense of purpose and motivation, and the sense that we are connected with a larger whole.
Living in Berkeley, I have had the opportunity to meet some interesting people--people drawn to the city for its intellectualism, and for its radical reputation; people who are passionate about their causes that they have researched extensively. But I can see these people--they're all preachers of their own little religion in a way--and they are so far removed from what other people are seeing and thinking that they have trouble connecting. I respect their intelligence and their passion for their cause. But there's a part of me that says: "I'm a writer; if I'm writing to share my ideas, then I need to understand how to connect with the people around me."
Answer number 2 is forthcoming.
Monday, July 14, 2008
Carrot and Stick
Where does motivation come from?
The idea of the carrot and the stick suggest external forces: we chase the carrot--the external reward--and we flee the stick--external punishment. It seems to me that both of these forces of motivation are impoverished with respect to character growth.
If we look at the issue using the perspective of Maslow's hierarchy of needs, we might see the carrot and the stick as fulfilling lower-level needs--safety, security, pleasure.
What have we got left if not the carrot and the stick? Maslow would suggest we have our growth and our joy in the mastery of new things. (or is that a metaphorical carrot)?
Ach! I'm getting tangled in metaphor. The point I'm really aiming at is the value of being accountable to yourself rather than to someone else. Do the work because it will satisfy what you want to accomplish in your life. Do it for yourself. Do it because you have a sense of purpose that will be served by working on your project.
The idea of the carrot and the stick suggest external forces: we chase the carrot--the external reward--and we flee the stick--external punishment. It seems to me that both of these forces of motivation are impoverished with respect to character growth.
If we look at the issue using the perspective of Maslow's hierarchy of needs, we might see the carrot and the stick as fulfilling lower-level needs--safety, security, pleasure.
What have we got left if not the carrot and the stick? Maslow would suggest we have our growth and our joy in the mastery of new things. (or is that a metaphorical carrot)?
Ach! I'm getting tangled in metaphor. The point I'm really aiming at is the value of being accountable to yourself rather than to someone else. Do the work because it will satisfy what you want to accomplish in your life. Do it for yourself. Do it because you have a sense of purpose that will be served by working on your project.
Sunday, July 13, 2008
Why work every day?
I was ready to blow off writing my blog this evening. I was tired--a touch too much sun, a bit of dehydration and a little headache. But there it was 11:30pm and I felt like just dropping in a few words.
Thinking about the Tour de France a bit more. The announcers talk a lot about embracing the pain of the ride. I think the Tour de France is a decent parallel for writing a dissertation in some ways--or more generally, athletic endeavor is--especially when it involve endurance.
I was writing about the curtains of misery and the sense that the work of the dissertation writer is painful. If there is pain in writing a dissertation, I wonder whether it ought not be like the pain of one of those riders. There is pain in working through the difficult spots, and there will be difficult spots. Life is like that generally. I have no doubt in my mind that the riders in the Tour de France love riding in general. The pain comes from pushing their limits--but they're pushing their limits doing something they love. This is a far cry from the sense of misery that I have heard reported from many writers. Many writers come to hate their project.
Ok, sure, when you're riding in a race, you probably don't have your team leader telling you how inadequate your work is--and when you're a dissertation writer there's a great chance that you do--at least I know lots of writers who have gotten that general message from their faculty committee.
I wonder how many writers really love both their project and the general work of writing academic writing before they run into the dissertation project and an aggressive, insulting, or negative faculty committee.
It seems to me that embracing the pain of the difficult spots in the task is much easier if you generally enjoy what you're doing.
The thing about constant practice, and persisting in your practice against whatever obstacles you may face, is that it can become easier. At 10:30pm tonight I was ready to go to sleep, and I lay back in bed to do a little reading to drop off to sleep. But I felt that writing was worth the effort--because I know that writing is not painful in itself; it's only painful to me when I try to force through the difficult spots. And I know that what seems difficult seems less difficult with greater practice.
This, I think, occurs on many levels--whether your practice is simply to write with greater ease, or your practice is to find focus for your project, by practicing and by repeating the effort, your work will improve.
Thinking about the Tour de France a bit more. The announcers talk a lot about embracing the pain of the ride. I think the Tour de France is a decent parallel for writing a dissertation in some ways--or more generally, athletic endeavor is--especially when it involve endurance.
I was writing about the curtains of misery and the sense that the work of the dissertation writer is painful. If there is pain in writing a dissertation, I wonder whether it ought not be like the pain of one of those riders. There is pain in working through the difficult spots, and there will be difficult spots. Life is like that generally. I have no doubt in my mind that the riders in the Tour de France love riding in general. The pain comes from pushing their limits--but they're pushing their limits doing something they love. This is a far cry from the sense of misery that I have heard reported from many writers. Many writers come to hate their project.
Ok, sure, when you're riding in a race, you probably don't have your team leader telling you how inadequate your work is--and when you're a dissertation writer there's a great chance that you do--at least I know lots of writers who have gotten that general message from their faculty committee.
I wonder how many writers really love both their project and the general work of writing academic writing before they run into the dissertation project and an aggressive, insulting, or negative faculty committee.
It seems to me that embracing the pain of the difficult spots in the task is much easier if you generally enjoy what you're doing.
The thing about constant practice, and persisting in your practice against whatever obstacles you may face, is that it can become easier. At 10:30pm tonight I was ready to go to sleep, and I lay back in bed to do a little reading to drop off to sleep. But I felt that writing was worth the effort--because I know that writing is not painful in itself; it's only painful to me when I try to force through the difficult spots. And I know that what seems difficult seems less difficult with greater practice.
This, I think, occurs on many levels--whether your practice is simply to write with greater ease, or your practice is to find focus for your project, by practicing and by repeating the effort, your work will improve.
Friday, July 11, 2008
Little Pieces of Work
I was thinking about how we can break down tasks.
One of the things that I have heard reported by many writers is that they are daunted by the size of the project that lies before them. "Overwhelmed" is a word I hear a lot.
I know what it's like to feel overwhelmed by a project--a sense that the project is this massive monolith that cannot be moved. We have to learn to chip away at it.
Every big project is composed of little projects. As the saying foes: the journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step. Not only does it begin with a single step, but it is carried to its completion by always taking one more step, until the journey is over.
Every big piece of work is made of simply taking he work one step at a time. It can be daunting to sit down in the morning and say "ok, now I'm going to work on my dissertation for the next three hours." But if we can see that three hour period as made up of a number of smaller tasks--a few fifteen minute tasks, maybe a few thirty minute tasks--then it may often be easier to engage in the work.
It's great to make optimistic plans. It's great to assume that you're going to be extremely productive. But it's also great to take reality into account. It's fine to make a plan that you're going to work on your dissertation for eight hours on Saturday--but if the reality is that on Saturday after Saturday you don't work eight hours, then you need to reconsider the plans you're making. So for me, instead of making big plans, I like to make small plans--or at least, I like to make small plans that break apart my big plans. This analytical process--this process of dividing a project--can be problematic in many ways, but I find that it really helps me get moving.
If I can set myself a task for fifteen minutes--that's easy. If I can see the need to write one paragraph on a specific subject, well, writing one paragraph is not a daunting task. If I can get myself to take action for fifteen minutes, that's better than planning on working three hours and getting nothing done. But even better is that if I can do the one thing in fifteen minutes, then I feel good about myself, and I feel good about working, and I can try something else for the next fifteen minutes, and if I get something done in that fifteen minutes I feel even better about myself.
If we keep our goals really small and really focused, then they are not overwhelming. It's not surprising that someone would be overwhelmed if they were thinking "I have to work on my dissertation." It would be a lot more surprising if someone got overwhelmed saying "I have to write one paragraph on subject X."
Of course if someone did get overwhelmed just trying to write one paragraph, we could break the task of writing that paragraph into different steps.
Back in the day when I still was relatively current on computers, I was a teaching assistant for a basic programming course. This was maybe 1993 or 1994--the course taught the computer language "pascal", which I knew fairly well, and was, for the first time, integrating html into the course material. As a programmer, it's easy to get used to thinking about the very small steps that make up a process. The more so, the more primitive the language. Html and Pascal both are high level languages in which single commands get translated to many different little commands for a given computer (actually, html isn't really that kind of language at all, but rather specific programs use html as sets of intstructions--but that's kind of beside the point).
In the class for which I was a TA, we had on one exam a question that asked the students to write pseudo-code for boiling water.
Most students answered something like this:
Fill a pot with water
put it on the stove
turn on the stove
Well, that is fine, but it leaves out a lot of detail. Take that first step, for example: "fill a pot with water." Where does the pot come from? where does the water come from? how does the pot get filled with water? If we wanted, we could break this step down into smaller steps:
Find a pot
pick it up
carry the pot to the sink
place the pot beneath the faucet
turn on the faucet
wait for the pot to fill
We might have to break some of those steps down, too.
There is complexity that we take for granted--we know where we keep pots in our kitchen, and we know how to fill them with water, so we take those little steps for granted.
But in writing a dissertation, we are not so familiar with the terrain. We need to be willing to take the project even the simplest, smallest step at a time. We need to be able to exploit that way of looking at the project: if we are feeling overwhelmed, just take the smallest task that we can find and work on it.
My one caveat: don't let that one next task always be to read something else--because there's always something else to read, but if you don't write, you won't get finished writing. That being said, the writing tasks can be broken up into very small pieces--write a paragraph on one subject, a page on another, two sentences on yet another. Whatever the size, it is more important to do a little work, than it is to make a big plan and do less. By breaking your project up into little pieces of work, you can focus your efforts.
One of the things that I have heard reported by many writers is that they are daunted by the size of the project that lies before them. "Overwhelmed" is a word I hear a lot.
I know what it's like to feel overwhelmed by a project--a sense that the project is this massive monolith that cannot be moved. We have to learn to chip away at it.
Every big project is composed of little projects. As the saying foes: the journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step. Not only does it begin with a single step, but it is carried to its completion by always taking one more step, until the journey is over.
Every big piece of work is made of simply taking he work one step at a time. It can be daunting to sit down in the morning and say "ok, now I'm going to work on my dissertation for the next three hours." But if we can see that three hour period as made up of a number of smaller tasks--a few fifteen minute tasks, maybe a few thirty minute tasks--then it may often be easier to engage in the work.
It's great to make optimistic plans. It's great to assume that you're going to be extremely productive. But it's also great to take reality into account. It's fine to make a plan that you're going to work on your dissertation for eight hours on Saturday--but if the reality is that on Saturday after Saturday you don't work eight hours, then you need to reconsider the plans you're making. So for me, instead of making big plans, I like to make small plans--or at least, I like to make small plans that break apart my big plans. This analytical process--this process of dividing a project--can be problematic in many ways, but I find that it really helps me get moving.
If I can set myself a task for fifteen minutes--that's easy. If I can see the need to write one paragraph on a specific subject, well, writing one paragraph is not a daunting task. If I can get myself to take action for fifteen minutes, that's better than planning on working three hours and getting nothing done. But even better is that if I can do the one thing in fifteen minutes, then I feel good about myself, and I feel good about working, and I can try something else for the next fifteen minutes, and if I get something done in that fifteen minutes I feel even better about myself.
If we keep our goals really small and really focused, then they are not overwhelming. It's not surprising that someone would be overwhelmed if they were thinking "I have to work on my dissertation." It would be a lot more surprising if someone got overwhelmed saying "I have to write one paragraph on subject X."
Of course if someone did get overwhelmed just trying to write one paragraph, we could break the task of writing that paragraph into different steps.
Back in the day when I still was relatively current on computers, I was a teaching assistant for a basic programming course. This was maybe 1993 or 1994--the course taught the computer language "pascal", which I knew fairly well, and was, for the first time, integrating html into the course material. As a programmer, it's easy to get used to thinking about the very small steps that make up a process. The more so, the more primitive the language. Html and Pascal both are high level languages in which single commands get translated to many different little commands for a given computer (actually, html isn't really that kind of language at all, but rather specific programs use html as sets of intstructions--but that's kind of beside the point).
In the class for which I was a TA, we had on one exam a question that asked the students to write pseudo-code for boiling water.
Most students answered something like this:
Fill a pot with water
put it on the stove
turn on the stove
Well, that is fine, but it leaves out a lot of detail. Take that first step, for example: "fill a pot with water." Where does the pot come from? where does the water come from? how does the pot get filled with water? If we wanted, we could break this step down into smaller steps:
Find a pot
pick it up
carry the pot to the sink
place the pot beneath the faucet
turn on the faucet
wait for the pot to fill
We might have to break some of those steps down, too.
There is complexity that we take for granted--we know where we keep pots in our kitchen, and we know how to fill them with water, so we take those little steps for granted.
But in writing a dissertation, we are not so familiar with the terrain. We need to be willing to take the project even the simplest, smallest step at a time. We need to be able to exploit that way of looking at the project: if we are feeling overwhelmed, just take the smallest task that we can find and work on it.
My one caveat: don't let that one next task always be to read something else--because there's always something else to read, but if you don't write, you won't get finished writing. That being said, the writing tasks can be broken up into very small pieces--write a paragraph on one subject, a page on another, two sentences on yet another. Whatever the size, it is more important to do a little work, than it is to make a big plan and do less. By breaking your project up into little pieces of work, you can focus your efforts.
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