The other day a friend of mine wrote a really great blog post where he surveyed several PhD students about how they managed their time while working on their PhD. You can read his post here: http://tinyurl.com/o28leab. I thought I would weigh in on the matter in this blog post.
Typically one receives the following advice from one source or another: “When working on your PhD (especially in the British system where you typically have 3 years to write a 100,000 word thesis) you should treat it like a full-time job. Set your hours 9-5 and try to work around 40 per week.”
While this is great advice, it only really works in an ideal world where things like family obligations, community involvement, required and not-so-required-but-really-
For me, a 40 hour PhD thesis work week is next to impossible. For this season in my life, one which is defined in a big way by my place in the PhD program, I have to balance several things. What I have determined though, is that I will do my best to not make my family suffer because of the pressures of academia. To be honest, this might mean I don’t achieve as much as some of the other students during this period in my life. I’m ok with this because there will other seasons in my life where some of these aspects of academia will be more accessible. I’ve written about this in a past post if you want to check it out. http://www.thetwocities.com/practical-theology/spiritual-formation/gods-timing-grrr/
I also work weirdly in comparison to others, especially when I am involved in writing up the research I have done. After I have a lot of notes and have read quite a bit, I need long 12-16 hours stretches to sit and write (with various ADHD conciliatory breaks of course!). This usually involves going in around 10:00am (after seeing off the boys to school) and staying at/around/near/in the proximity of the office until well past midnight. I tend to write in spurts and try to get everything squeezed out of it of my brain in one sitting in some way, shape, or form. Then I leave it and go back a day or so later and start shaping things to a somewhat coherent form, usually in another long stretch. Then as the week progresses I fine tune stuff enough to send into my supervisor, who mercilessly tears it to shreds and forces me to become a better writer and thinker through this process.
Needless to say I don’t do this all the time, it’s usually at the end of a process of going in on a daily basis and juggling my research and work (15-20 hours per week) schedule. I try to be home for dinner every night. There are even a few nights a week where I do things like lead a small group, coach my sons football team, or attend the one of the other boys’ games. These nights pretty much force me (in a good way) to be home and involved in the life of my family. I also like to skip out on my research time every once and a while and take my wife on a date during the day when the kids are at school.
I don’t write any of this to compare or contrast myself with anyone else. The best advice I received about doing PhD work is to find a schedule that works for you and stick to it. Different people work in different ways. The 9-5 everyday is a great place start but I would advise an incoming student to hold it loosely and make sure you stay productive.
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