Summer Wonderland or Christmas in the Tropics

Everyone in the Western Christian world is now wishing each other Happy Holidays. Whether you believe it or not, it is part of many people’s lives and it influences our calendar year. But how is it to spend Christmas in the southern hemisphere, where signs saying Let It Snow abound but the temperature is reaching 40 celsius? Our blog editor, who is currently back home in Brazil, shares her views about melting on Christmas and the breaks we all need to take sometimes.

A Short Guide to Productive Procrastination

Some days you need to do Ph.D. work but you don’t feel like doing research, writing your dissertation, or doing anything remotely deemed important. Relatable, right? So what do you do if you still have to do something? Eduarda shares a few tips on how to procrastinate writing and researching and still be somewhat productive with your doctoral studies at the same time.

Pint and PhD: an opportunity for research students to meet and share their work

How is the process of talking informally about your research? No researcher is an island, even though the research experience can be quite lonely for some, knowing how to share your research in a more informal way but still among peers is not only a good ability to have, but it can also open your mind and see what you are doing in a different light. In this post, Giles Penman shares his experience of talking about his research topic at the fortnightly Pint & PhD session organised by our Postgraduate Engagement Team.

How I did a PhD with a broken brain

In 2015 I had a severe reaction to an antidepressant. Overnight I went from someone who had never experienced any physical anxiety symptoms to major panic attacks, agoraphobia, and constant general anxiety. I no longer had the capacity to do my PhD and took temporary withdrawal for a year where I had to learn how to function as a human being again. Upon returning to my PhD, a major achievement in itself, I realised the stress of even half an hour’s worth of work rendered me not only incapable of functioning for the rest of the day, but potentially the day after too. How was I supposed to do a PhD if I couldn’t even manage half an hour? If I was to complete my PhD, I needed to figure out how to work a stress-free day. Over the course of a couple of years I learnt and refined a routine that helped me to achieve this. It wasn’t much fun and I still struggle a lot of the time. I fall out of the routine and take shortcuts. I am human after all. But I sit here with a finished thesis and time to spare. This is how I did my PhD with a broken brain.

How to Survive Being at Home

By Merle van den Akker

We have to stay at home. Indoors. All the time. And that’s hard. But it’s for keeping ourselves and others safe. So, it’s time to stop rebelling and acting like a 12-year-old, and to just make the best of a tough situation. So, what can you do from home?

If you have any tips on what to do when staying at home, tweet us at @ResearchEx, email us at libraryblogs@warwick.ac.uk, or leave a comment below.

And That’s OK

By Zakiyya Adam

Doing a PhD is demanding at the best of times, let alone amidst a global pandemic. Zakiyya discusses why productivity should not be the priority for PhDs right now.

What have you found to help you cope during the global pandemic? Tweet us at @ResearchEx, email us at libraryblogs@warwick.ac.uk, or leave a comment below.

On dealing with Anxiety in a highly competitive environment (Part 2 – Confidence)

By Alice Cuzzucoli

One of the most challenging aspects we face in academia is how to measure our self-worth. On top of the constant amount of work we deal with, this further burden can make us feel like we are misinterpreting what we have to do to be “that exceptional”. So, when it comes to comparing ourselves to others, it is natural to feel inferior, or inadequate even. Ultimately, our confidence is what suffers from it, both from an individual and a collective point of view. In the second part of her series of essays, Alice discusses how her relationship with self-worth and competition affected her confidence during her PhD.

How do you deal with feelings of worthlessness or inadequacy? Tweet us at @ResearchEx, email us at libraryblogs@warwick.ac.uk, or leave a comment below.

Fallow Fields, Seeds and Academic Gold Rush in the Corona crisis

Planting, harvesting and the stolen time of rest. Can farm life provide a metaphor for academic life? Is the current COVID-tunnel finally creating an occasion for rest and nourishment or did it leave many researchers in even more pressure to perform, in a new virtual world, having to pay the costly interests of time debt? Do you feel the need to find golden productivity before your peers? Our author reflects on the many challenges faced with planting and sowing, nourishing your land, a waiting for your crops to yield results, be it your plants or your ideas.

Managing Time in a PhD

One of the biggest benefits of a PhD is its flexibility. There are no set working hours. If you do not want to work 40 hours a week, don’t. If you prefer to have the Wednesday and the Saturday off rather than a regular weekend, do it. If you do not want to work one day, or one week, you do not have to. But unsurprisingly, this can backfire. Due to a lack of structure, what you need the most in a PhD is good time management!