FREAKING OUT and HERE'S WHY:
List of things to do:
- Finish current chapter
- Start next chapter
- Amend lit review
- Finish abstract for 2010 Conference
- Continue primary source analysis of Melbourne and Indian materials
- Begin research for my T&L research project
- Plan my next lectures
- Plan my next tutorials
- Hand in all essay marks
- Read countless books
- Order Nandi Bhatia's book on Indian Theatre.
- and...and...and...
ARGH! It's enough to make me want to tear my hair out, hop in my car and drive continuously north until I hit some isolated paradise just shy of Broome. But instead of escaping, or facing my list of infinite things-to-do head-on, I'm here procrastinating and whinging about how much I have to do.
Or am I? Simply typing the list out made me feel better - simply seeing the things I was most concerned about accomplishing, there in black and white, made them seem more accomplishable. They came into my head in no particular order, though obviously the most pressing appeared at the top. Those are the big issues...I may as well have simply written 'Finish thesis and be perfect tutor'. So I started with the little one... I ordered the Bhatia book through GetIt. DONE.
Then I finished all my marking and handed all the essays and marks back to the School of Music. DONE!
Then I looked for the next small task.... write my abstract. Spent some time and...DONE!
Then I looked at the lecture and tute plans and decided I'd be better off doing those in July, to keep the prep fresh in my mind. So not done, but at least rationalised and planned.
Then, feeling far more relaxed, I returned to the BIG stuff. Okay - finish chapter. I made an appointment with my supervisor, saying that I'd be handing in a draft by the 22nd June. So not done, but well on the way, and now have impetus to focus on this.
A Ph.D is like a marathon, only instead of 40 miles, it's 40 months. Well - that's pithy, but it's not accurate. We all talk about having a plan for our thesis, and we separate the tasks into months or semesters...but that's not how it gets done. It gets done day to day, hour to hour. Virginia Woolf said we live in the hours. And it's true. It's all very well to have a GRS approved thesis plan, but you've got to make little lists and plans and goals along the way. Sometimes my goal is write 500 words on 'x'. Not much, but at the end of the day you get a tick, and you got you 500 words. Only then do you get the satisfaction of achievement everyday that you need. And only then can you put the next foot out to take the next step.
So feeling more relaxed and focused again, I'm going back to a discussion of opera in India -and I can't wait!