2.13 define done-ness - it's less obvious than you think!
lately, i've been asking people to define not just the tasks they want to focus on - but how they'll know when that task is done. and it's a LOT harder than you might think it is! this week's episode gives you two strategies for figuring out doneness, and debunks a PERSISTENT myth about how other people know when they're done. get into it!
referenced:
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If the answer to this question was easy. I wouldn't need to record a whole podcast about it. Let's talk about how to know when you are done on this episode of
📍 Welcome to Grad School is Hard, But... A Thrive PhD podcast. I'm Dr. Katy Peplin and this is a show for everyone who's doing the hard work of being a human and a scholar. And in season two, I'll introduce you to various tools that might make the hard stuff from writing to managing your time to taking care of your brain just a little bit easier.
And if you like what you hear on this podcast, you're going to love what I have cooked up for you in summer camp. More details in the show notes. Now let's get into it.
As part of the planning process for the sprint kickoff that I run in the summer camp program, I ask people to define not only what tasks they're going to work on over the course of the two weeks, but crucially how they know when that task is done. And you'd be surprised, or maybe you wouldn't be by how difficult an answer that can be.
If it were easier to know when things were done. I think a lot of academic planning, estimation, deadlines would be a lot easier because it'd be a concrete finish line. You're done preparing for exams when you've read all the books. You are ready to turn in that draft when it exists. But as we know those questions, aren't as clear cut. They aren't as black and white as we might want them to be. And that gray area invites in all kinds of new friends to play like perfectionism, avoidance anxiety, because your definition of done and everyone else's might be really different from one another.
So let's get into what kinds of tasks it's really important to define and done point for and how you might go about doing that.
Now. Raise your hand. Or don't, I mean, you're listening to a podcast, so I can't really tell, but raise your hand if you have ever thought. Okay. I wish that somebody would just give me a to-do list for everything that I need to do in order to have this project be done. Just give me a to-do list for my dissertation. I don't care if it's 600 things long. I want to see every single step so that I can check it out.
So that I can check them off one by one. It might take me years, but I will have my list and I will feel secure in my list hood. Now I have begged for such a list. I've had clients beg me for a list themselves and I regret to inform you that it really doesn't exist. And partially because there is no standard for when something is done.
For example. Take something like a draft of a piece of writing your advisor might leave you with a common refrain that says, come back to me when your draft is done and I'll give you some feedback and you say, great. That makes sense. As soon as the draft is done, I'll come back and then you work on it.
And you work on it and you work on it and then it's not really clear to you when it's done. Is it done when all of the pros exists, even if some of it is a little bit rough, is it done when all of the citations are there? Is it done when every table and figure is complete and in the document? Is it done when it's copy edited? Is it done when it's formatted or is it done at some other mysterious time that you don't really know about.
In just that one example, we can see where there are multiple invitations for your brain to jump in and either tell you that something is done way before it is. Or much more likely to stall you from the next step because you are pretty sure that your version of done isn't as good as what other people are expecting.
So in this week's episode, I really want to give you a couple of tools to define doneness. Not because they will protect you from feedback. Not because they are guaranteed to be the same definition of doneness as your advisor. Or your editor or whomever else you're submitting work to, but because they bring clarity to what can otherwise be a foggy finished line.
One way to measure doneness is to measure against the requirements. This is one of those situations where on paper, it seems really simple. Yes. Find the requirements for what a dissertation chapter must be, meet the requirements. And then I am done. But I don't know about you. Nobody handed me a list and said, here are the requirements for your dissertation chapter. It needs to be this number of pages. It needs to be this number of citations. It needs to be this level of formatted. People just said, come back when your draft is done and expected me to know what that meant.
Now. If you're in a program that gives you really clear guidelines. Enjoy them. Uh, feel free to skip ahead a couple of seconds, but if you don't. There's two ways to go about defining the requirements. The first way is to find a completed object that is similar to what you're trying to do. So in the case of a dissertation chapter, this might be somebody else's chapter that you're looking at, maybe an older graduate student who's a couple of years ahead of you is willing to share, you know, an in progress drafts so that you can see it.
But that's one way, find an example and then extrapolate backwards. If there's was 50 pages, then yours is probably going to be about 50 pages. If they cited 15 different sources, then you know, that 15 sources is probably closer to the ballpark than 30 or 50 or a hundred sources. It's not perfect.
But it will give you a ballpark estimate around about close enough estimate that will help, you know, when you've met all of the requirements. And if you meet the requirements, then you're done. The second level. The second way to know if you are done is to measure it against a deadline and your ideal plan.
So I sometimes refer to this is the Jedi mind trick effect. I had an advisor who only wanted to see what she described as polished writing. She didn't want to see anything in new draft version. She didn't want to see any bullet points or any placeholder references. She really wanted to see something polished, which meant that the space between when I could use feedback on my writing and what it was actually done enough to send to her was a pretty big space, months sometimes even. And so I had to build in a couple of extra deadlines and supports for myself, whether it was through a writing group or exchanging drafts with friends. Or doing what I would call a Jedi mind trick where I would finish up the chapter. I would know there were big holes in it. I would know that certain sections weren't as defined as other sections or that she might have feedback about things, but I would stop it at like 70% complete content-wise and then I would spend three or four days polishing up what I had.
I would go ahead and do all the formatting. I would add in the footnotes. I would make the tabs the way they were. We're supposed to be, and then I would send it to her. Knowing that it wasn't a complete draft, but it looked like a complete draft and it read like a complete draft. That way when she invariably had comments, I would go back and say, great. Thank you. That's awesome.
It was the only way for me to get feedback on my work in progress, and actually be able to revise it according to these requirements, that for whatever reason she was unwilling or unable to give me outright.
So, if you can't measure against the requirements, you can go with way two, which is do your best to make sure that it looks like it's done and acts like it's done. And then get that feedback. I'm not going to sugarcoat it. It doesn't feel good to send in work that, you know, could be better. But more often than not the earlier you engage the feedback. The earlier you engage the next step of the process, whatever comes after being done with the phase that you're on. So if that means being done with the research, it means the sooner you can start writing it up.
It might be that the sooner you get a draft, your advisor, the sooner you have comments to revise, or the sooner that you send something out to a journal, the sooner they send it back to you. With, you know, their journal Lee. Judgment. The idea here is that being done- even if it feels a little uncomfortable, even if you receive feedback that things need to be improved- is ultimately a much faster way to move through the process .
Because I'm here to let you in on a little secret. I have not. In all of my years of working with clients of working on things myself. I met anyone who has an internal switch that flips and says, ah, yes, this thing is done. This paper's ready. This chapter is complete. This dissertation is ready to go.
Everyone's doneness this is at least partially. Constrained by an outside force, whether that is your funding running out or your maternity leave or your advisor going off break for the summer, there's a thousand things that could create an external circumstance, but often your doneness is defined at least in part by this external circumstance that may or may not even be related to your work.
Your dissertation is done because you need it to be defended in August so that you can start your job in September. Your journal article is ready to go back to the journal because they asked for it to be backed by this specific date. So, if you're waiting for this kind of mysterious sense of satisfaction to know that something's done, then, in my experience, you're going to be waiting a long time. But overall. If you have a task that's on your task list this week, or for this summer, I really encourage you to take a couple of extra minutes and decide how you will know when that task is done.
It won't guarantee that you don't spend an extra couple of days polishing or that you don't have some sort of emotional wobbles at the end , worrying about whether this is actually good enough, but by defining doneness, you won't be waiting around for this abstract, somewhat mysterious sense that this is ready to go.
Now you will have an outside list of requirements, maybe written down, maybe in your head that will help you judge that doneness. And then you can be on to the next thing. Because if there's one thing that's true about grad school, that there will always be a next thing.
And if this is the kind of thinking that really appeals to you, then you might want to check out summer camp.
Summer camp is built around two weeks, sprints that are going to help you work more intentionally and also rest more intentionally. Join us for the sessions that work for your schedule. Skip the ones that don't and know that there are all sorts of benefits and perks. There are planning courses, live events, small group cabins, so that you can get to know people, A camp fire to work around chat, share resources and much more. The link in the bio has all of the information about various packages. That'll save you money, sliding scale payment plans.
Session one is already underway, but session two starts on May 29th. And like I said, these are going on all summer long. If you are interested in joining us. Use the code podcast for 10% off. Any sliding scale level or payment plan. Thanks so much. And I hope to see you around either the camp neighborhood or back here in this space next week.
📍 Thank you for listening to Grad School is Hard, but... You can find more information and resources in the show notes and at thrive-phd.com. Every month, I'll select one reviewer for a free 45 minute session with me. So please subscribe, rate, and review to help spread the word about the show. Thanks so much and I'll see you again soon!
2.11 - don't fall into the traps! - summer planning strategies
what's like new year's eve, but even MORE if you're a scholar? the first day of summer - or any time when you're released from other jobs and "get to" focus on your writing!
however, summer can be a trap! and if aren't careful, you can end the summer even more exhausted than when you started - so listen in for my top three strategies for planning a summer that gets stuff done, but not at the expense of your health and well being.
plus find out about my new summer camp - and don't forget to use the code PODCAST for 10% off!
resources:
PS! if you are user "DakotaPlains" you won a free session with me! email at hello@thrive-phd.com to claim your free session!!
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Nothing says summer, like great weather, endless blue skies and a completely unreasonable plan for how much work you'll get done to catch up and start the school year off right. Join me for some tips on summer planning on this week's episode of
📍 Welcome to Grad School is Hard, But... A Thrive PhD podcast. I'm Dr. Katy Peplin and this is a show for everyone who's doing the hard work of being a human and a scholar. And in season two, I'll introduce you to various tools that might make the hard stuff from writing to managing your time to taking care of your brain just a little bit easier.
And if you like what you hear on this podcast, you're going to love what I have cooked up for you in summer camp. More details in the show notes. Now let's get into it.
If you're listening to this podcast, it's probably because you are having some sort of a schedule change in the next couple of weeks. For American and Canadian academics specifically. Although I'm sure that our colleagues around the globe and in various different hemispheres also have a similar situation.
The academic winter term is ending. The seniors are graduating, the campuses are emptying out. You can finally park again. And for most academics, that means that the drumbeat has started. Time to catch up on your writing. Time to catch up on your work. Time to get done. All of the things that you said you were going to do over the school year, and really didn't get a chance to.
So this week, I'm here to share a couple of my top tips for summer planning in the hopes that you won't make the mistakes that I did. And you'll set yourself up for a summer where you not only emerge having done the most important things that you wanted to do.
But you also arrive in September, not burned out, having pushed all summer with no thought about recovery. So let's get into it.
If there's one thing to academics, that's even more seductive than new year's energy. That belief that starting on January 1st, we're going to be a whole new person. It's the idea, belief, traditional system, near religion that almost all academics at some point have subscribed to. That as soon as the semester ends, as soon as the term is done.
You're going to be a whole new person. You're going to write in the morning, you're going to meal prep. You're going to get on top of your reading. You're going to finish all of those journal article drafts that have been languishing. Just everything about you is going to change. And what was hard will be easy again.
Now I have seen that happen. And psychologically speaking, we do know that anytime that you have a big schedule change, For example, like teaching full time during the semester, and then suddenly not teaching once the term ends.
Anytime that you have a big schedule change like that the conditions are ripe for some behavior modifications. It makes sense, right? If your schedule changes, then it means that you have new time cues during the day, perhaps new body cues, maybe new family routines, or rhythms that are going to help you support changes.
When one thing changes, it's easier to change other things too. But I am here to caution you as someone who has gone into many as summer believing that I would be radically different person. The instant that I walked out of class that last day before grades were due. I do have to counsel you that, unless you're really intentional about it, I've seen one or two things happen over the course of the summer.
Option one, that's pretty common and I'm here to normalize it in case it's ever happened to you is: you submit your final grades, yours schedule changes, and you take a well-deserved break. Maybe it lasts for a week, maybe it lasts for a little bit longer. You catch up with all of those friends, you take that family trip and I'm not here to knock any of that.
But very quickly, one week off, it turns into two and then the avoidance monster shows up. . And it starts to feel a little bit harder every day that goes by to get back into those routines and let's face it summer isn't going to throw you back into those routines. There will be places to go and pools to swim in, I hope! I'm an ex lifeguard, so I love pools.
Summer, isn't going to send you an engraved invitation that says, Hey, wouldn't it be great if you got back to your dissertation right now, it's just not in the nature of the season. If you come back, you're going to have to plan for it. So that's option one. Time drifts. And then all of the sudden it's maybe mid July or maybe even mid August, and you're really crunching to get everything done, including prep for the next semester.
Option two are people who hit the ground, running the instant that their final grades are in. They start their new schedule, their new exercise program. They have a rhythm for how, and when they check in with their friends, every moment is scheduled.
And they push, push, push. And in the beginning it feels amazing. Like those first couple of days of January where your resolutions feel really good and really supportive and you're like, yeah, I'm doing this.
What I see happening with these friends though in the option two category is that they push it a little bit hard, a little bit fast, and they ignore the fact that the school year is long.
That they are tired and they need a little bit of time to refresh and recharge and that just replacing one type of work, all consuming, overwhelming for another. Isn't going to get them that kind of sense of accomplishment and rest that they really need. Yeah, it does feel good to get that article draft submitted to get that syllabus done, to get back on top of your email or your reading list.
But all of those things in and of themselves, aren't going to make you any more rested or any less burned out. They're just going to mean that there are new things on your to-do list. Because if there's one academic truth that I know to be true, it's that doing things begets more things to do.
So whether or not you fallen into category a or category B in the past. Or maybe. A unique category. All of your own, here are my top three tips for planning a summer that's going to allow you to be flexible, to be spontaneous, but also give you enough structure so that you're not overwhelmed by all of the things that you could do.
Number one is to book your fun, your recovery, all of your human things in first. Most of us are drawn to this profession because in some way or another we're happier, we get a little bit more done. We enjoy the structure and the routine of the school year.
And while it can feel good initially to completely throw all of that routine and structure to the wind, eventually a little bit of structure can go a long way into making sure that you're the most supported, effective person that you can be. So why not build that structure in with things that are going to help you recharge recover, or maybe even dare? I say it have a little fun this summer.
Maybe you sign up for a yoga class that is a little bit earlier than you might want to, but it gets you out of the house two days a week and you then get to stay at your favorite library afterwards to work a little bit on your dissertation. Win-win it's a structure and it's a movement and it gets you out into the sunshine. We love to see it.
Maybe you set up time to visit your family and take that long lost vacation that you've been talking about. Maybe you set up a schedule where you don't work on Fridays, where you take every Monday off this summer. Work will expand to fit the container that you give it. And so the first step in summer planning that I've seen be really effective is to limit the container of time available for work. If you wait until the perfect moment presents itself, to go on that vacation, to go camping, to do any of your other COVID safe, public health friendly activities this summer, it's never really going to present itself.
There's always going to be something more that you could be doing. So book those things in first and let the rest of it settle in around those blocks of fun and care.
My tool number two is actually to break the summer down into smaller, more comprehensible parts. I'm a big fan of splitting it into two weeks sprints. And I'll tell you a little bit more about that at the end of this podcast, but splitting the summer up into chunks, whether that is an initial phase of recovery after a really tough term, it could be two weeks where every two weeks you focus on a different section of the chapter that's due.
Or maybe you structure it around something like Wendy, Belcher's how to write a journal article book. There's thousands of ways to structure it, but breaking it down so that it's not just summer one giant monolith can really help you because a, it means that you have smaller chunks to plan for. And planning is always more effective and more accurate the smaller the chunk and the closer we are in time to it, just by nature of the unpredictability of life. So go ahead and break it down. This also has the added benefit of giving you a lot of different chances to restart. Say you have one, two weeks sprint this summer that doesn't really work out as planned.
Okay. You've still got a bunch more that you can try, but if you don't really break that summer plan down into different pieces, it's really hard to find that natural reset and evaluation point because it's not built in. You're going to have to wait until there's some sort of anxiety manifested crisis, like a late deadline or a meeting that you didn't expect to force that evaluation.
Better the evaluation, you know about and can do willingly, then the stuff that comes at the bottom of the oh man. I'm so behind valley.
And the third tool that I'm going to suggest is having a tiered system for your goals. It is really easy to say that you're going to do everything this summer and maybe you personally will get everything done this summer. In that case, I applaud you. I'm excited for you. Please tell us all how you did it.
But most of us will anxiety dump a huge long list of things that we even under the best of conditions don't have time and energy to do. At least not in the sport. At least not in the space of that ever shortening time between terms so. Rank that list, maybe it's most important to you that you get this dissertation chapter done so that you can apply for fellowships in the fall.
Second tier of importance is getting a syllabus. Prepped and third tier is starting to work on that collaboration that isn't really doing until the end of the year. Meaning December, but could be helpful if you get a jumpstart on it this summer. It's not that all of those things aren't important. They are. It's just that if you are finding yourself in the middle of a summer push and you know that you've only got two hours, it's going to be so much more beneficial for you to work on the top tier goals. Than it is to sort of spend the first couple of weeks, maybe even months. Either straight up avoiding your work or working on all of the things that are great, but they're ultimately nice to haves. They're not going to be those real powerhouses that make a difference and move you forward in a tangible way.
As I mentioned up top, these tips are coming from my multiple summers of experience where I have really great intentions and it just don't have the structure to support me in making all of those dreams come true. At least not at the expense of my own rest and recovery, that almost all of us need after long draining academic years.
If any of this sounds good to you. I invite you to click the link in the show notes and check out summer camp because summer camp is built on these three and a couple more of my key summer tenets.. There's two weeks sprints so that you can sign up for the weeks that you're going to be working and not feel like you have to pay for the weeks that you aren't.
There's sprint planning and check-in and evaluation courses that you can do on your own time to help you get clear about your goals, small groups, that we're calling cabins, that you can meet friends, hang out with and all of the fun and silliness, that's tied to the theme, which changes every camp session. I would love to have you there. So please use the code podcast for 10% off. You can book a four pack of sessions and get one free. Maybe you book for the whole summer and get two free or just sign up week by week as you feel like you need it.
I'm offering summer camp on a sliding scale, and you can learn all about it at the link in the show notes. Don't forget to use the code podcast for 10% off. Thank you so much. And I can't wait to see you next week. Bye.
📍 Thank you for listening to Grad School is Hard, but... You can find more information and resources in the show notes and at thrive-phd.com. Every month, I'll select one reviewer for a free 45 minute session with me. So please subscribe, rate, and review to help spread the word about the show. Thanks so much and I'll see you again soon!
2.8 decision fatigue will get you: menus for planning with flexibility
making decisions can be really hard - and when you're a scholar, a lot of your choices are important, and they all have the same level of urgency. menus are one of the best ways i have found to reduce overwhelm, and provide structure with flexibility - learn all about how i use them in this week's episode!
resources:
a blog post on menus
information about decision fatigue
I am giving away one FREE 45 minute session with me a month to anyone who reviews this podcast on Apple Podcasts! Leave a review and I'll announce the winners in the last episode of the month, and in my newsletter! Thank you so much for helping to spread the word about the podcast!
I am so excited to be hosting Structure as a Path to Sustainability with Dr. Kate Henry on May 10 - a one stop shop for overcoming overwhelm and lighting the way towards completing your next self-directed writing project. Enrollment opens soon, and my newsletter subscribers are the first to hear about all the new stuff (and the sales) so hop on the list here!
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If you're on team decision fatigue, if you can't figure out what to do. If you default to the easiest or most urgent thing, today's episode has strategies just for you.
📍 Welcome to Grad School is Hard, But... A Thrive PhD podcast. I'm Dr. Katy Peplin and this is a show for everyone who's doing the hard work of being a human and a scholar. And in season two, I'll introduce you to various tools that might make the hard stuff from writing to managing your time to taking care of your brain just a little bit easier.
And if you rate and review this podcast, by the end of the month, you'll be entered to win a free session from me. More details at the end of the episode. Now let's get into the good stuff. .
Today's episode is focused on a tool that I myself use every single day. And I have found that it is one of the most flexible and dare I say fun things that I or my clients have introduced into their day-to-day workflow. As you might've guessed from the title, it's about creating menus. So first let's talk about what a menu is and how you might implement it.
If you have ever. I had that feeling at the end of the day. Where you were like, I don't know what to make for dinner. My fridge is full of just raw ingredients and the amount of effort that it would take for me to decide and implement dinner is simply overwhelming then, you know the power of a menu.
Where instead of standing in front of that refrigerator, wondering. , Questioning, second guessing yourself. You walk into a restaurant, you look at the menu and you pick from those preselected options.
It is imperfect. Obviously, if you really want pizza and it's a diner, you might not be able to get what you want if it's not on the menu, but it does take away that stress of trying to figure out what your options are, ranking those options, and then choosing from them. The options are preselected and you then simply choose from between them.
I also love that menus have categories and here's why. The categories of different types of food. And obviously these categories were vary from restaurant to restaurant, but the categories help separate out the options by their qualities: could be by size, it could be by main protein. It could be by the role that it plays in the meal. But when you look at those different categories, say, at a diner. For instance, you might have omelets and sweet treats sides, combos.
That categorization helps you be a little bit more intentional. If you want something sweet, you immediately jump to that category. No need to go looking through the omelettes. If you know that you want pancakes, for example, And also it helps you bring a little bit more awareness into the kinds of things you're selecting and why.
So if you go through and you only ever eat from the sides menu, Then you know that, Hey, I'm going to either have to eat a few of these and be pretty conscious about what they contain or I'm going to need to add something more substantial to get a full meal.
Okay, now that everybody's hungry for pancakes. Let's talk about how we can use the concept of menus and the way that they shape and make our choices more intentional in our day-to-day work lives. Here are some ways that you can use menus. And all of these have been tested and approved by me and clients all around the world. So I really stand by these.
You might create a menu of work tasks for the day. Maybe you have different categories for teaching research, administration, life stuff, and you list out all of the options that you could work on during the day. And then when you sit down at your desk, you say, okay, what do I feel like teaching tasks, research tasks, and all of those options are laid out for you.
This can be particularly effective if you are working in a state where everything is important, but the urgency level is about the same across all of those categories. If you're in a state of it all needs to get done, a menu can help you see which things feel more possible and reduce a little bit of that decision fatigue so that you don't default into whatever tasks are in your email, which is what I normally do without a menu.
You could also use them for rest tasks almost even more effectively. Maybe you have, as I often do a menu of things that you could do on the weekend. And there are cleaning tasks. There are books you could read, there are shows you could catch up on, you have a list of things that might feel good to move your body. You maybe have a list of people that you want to text or catch up with. Maybe you even have a section of just pure fun.
Dance party, nap, whatever feels fun to you, but listing out all of those things is more flexible than saying, okay, from Saturday, I will do all of these cleaning things. And then I will do these work things. Instead of scheduling them out, it's more like walking into a brunch place and saying, oh, what feels good for me today?
It won't guarantee that you pick things that you might otherwise avoid. Just like you might not pick arugula on a menu if you absolutely hate it, but at least you offered yourself the chance.
The third way to use menus that I find is really, really effective is to think about menu-izing. If that's a word, making a menu out of various routines during your day. So I am a person who aspires to a morning routine. I think they look so good on Instagram. I want mine to be aesthetic A F, but the reality is that I have a chronic illness. My schedule is very variable and I'm just not going to do the same seven things every morning, every day. It's just not going to happen for me.
So instead I have a morning routine menu where I know that broadly speaking, I want to do something that settles my mind. I want to eat some food and I want to do something that moves my body a little bit. So in my menu, I have things for my mind, which could be a meditation. It could be journaling, it could be doing morning pages. It could be sitting down with my planner and I don't need to commit in advance to which one of those I'm going to do.
I just pick one from one of those categories. And the same goes with breakfast ideas and with the moving my body, it could be a walk around the block. It could be a 15 minute dance workout. It could be a lot of different things, but I know that I want to hit each one of those three categories and having a menu means that my routine might look different every single day, because there are so many different combinations.
But I'm going to hit my three main food groups, so to speak. Now. If you're listening and wondering will menus work for me? I'm not sure, but here are the patterns that I have noticed in when these are particularly effective tools for people.
If you're a person with decision fatigue, then I really have seen menus work wonders. All of us have to make literally thousands of decisions every single day. And one of the hardest things about being a PhD student. Is that there are so many things that you could be doing. And often we only keep say five or six of them, right at the top of our mind. And even though you might like to read that book, that's been on your shelf or go through and clean out your downloads folder or reach out to that person after a conference.
If it's not one of your like main six go-to tasks, it's going to be harder for you to remember to do it. So decision fatigue. Makes it so much easier for us to default into those top six or so tasks. And it really makes it difficult to even remember what the other tasks are. So a menu is a place where all of those options are written out. You might not remember that you liked this thing or that you wanted to do it until you see it written out.
If you find yourself staring at your desk at your planner, completely overwhelmed, and then you can definitely show you your choices and make it easier to pick.
As I mentioned before, I think that people underneath the broad umbrella of variable energy also really benefit from menus. I know that as a person with chronic illness, I'm never sure which energy version of myself is going to show up at any given hour of the day,
And so a menu lets me pick which things sounds the best to the brain and body that I have in that moment. It doesn't guarantee that I'm going to do the hard stuff, but if I'm in a situation where I say, okay, I need to do this incredibly difficult thing. And either I do that, or I don't a menu helps me see that. Yes, I could do that thing, but if I don't have the energy or the stamina for it, or I'm in too much pain or it just, isn't what I feel like in that particular moment, there are also five other things that I could do that would move me forward.
These menus can really help people who want a plan and want some sort of structure, but need some flexibility in it. And if you're a variable energy person or a variable attention, variable focus, if there's some variation and this is most of us, most of the time. Then menus can help you give yourself that structure, reduce some of the decisions and also allow for some flexibility from day to day, and hour to hour.
If you think that the idea of menus or something more flexible than just a, to do list that you must execute every single day sounds really appealing, then I have a workshop for you. I'm so excited to be collaborating with Dr. Kate Henry of The Tending Year on a workshop about structuring in a sustainable way. More details are available in the show notes and registration is going to be opening at the end of April. Thank you so much for joining me today. And I hope that whatever your menu contains, it has tasks that feel tasty for you and your future self. See you next week.
📍 Thank you for listening to Grad School is Hard, but... You can find more information and resources in the show notes and at thrive-phd.com. Every month, I'll select one reviewer for a free 45 minute session with me. So please subscribe, rate, and review to help spread the word about the show. Thanks so much and I'll see you again soon!