While I wait for comments to come back on my literature review, I have now begun the slow process of crafting the methods of my research. It is slow because, just like my proposal and the lit review chapter, I am sabotaging myself by finding a million other things to do rather than work on my chapter. The maddening part is that I truly want to succeed and turn in my chapters early so my mentor has enough time to review them before turning them in to my section professor; but I continue this crazy behavior of doing the opposite of what I am supposed to do which indicates that I don’t want to succeed.
Maddening, right?
Thank goodness my school sees fit to make the book Writing Your Dissertation in Fifteen Minutes a Day, by Joan Bolker,required reading. I just came across a section that describes my madness perfectly…and even says it is normal to have these “interruptions from the inside!”
Because writing a dissertation is so often lonely work, the part of you that is social, that likes and needs companionship, will continually try to drag you out into company – or drag it in. Bolker (1998), p. 86
She then mentions an essay by William G. Perry Jr. called “Sharing in the Costs of Growth” that discusses change – even positive change – as catalysts for a process of grief. While I can’t exactly articulate it, I understand it.
The way out of this is recognizing it and starting again. That is what this blog is all about – recognizing these tendencies so I can move on and be awesome.
It needs A LOT of work yet, but I don’t think it is too terrible for a draft…just needs some filling in. I have always been a short, to-the-point writer. It is not unusual for me to have the shortest paper in the class. However, I still was able to get A’s and my prof’s have seemed to appreciate my style.
Once I turned in one and a half pages for what was supposed to be a 6 page paper. Got an A. You realize that I have to pump myself up about this by remembering these stories because I feel incredibly insecure about what I turned in tonight, right?
I am writing this from my dark dining room. Time is running out. Time will kill me. I have been surviving on nothing but crackers and marshmallows for the past two days. They won’t let me leave.
They are filling my head with their theories and contradictions. Driving me mad. Pushing my ignorance away. My comforting ignorance; gone.
Plotting my revenge has been easy. I plan to burn them. Every last one. But not until I have used them as they abuse me.
Using them won’t be easy. There are too many of them. They outnumber me 30:1. They want me to run out of time. And they want me to use them.
I have become one of their contradictions. While time still grows short.
I may have figured out why I am struggling so much with all this reading and writing for my thesis: I suck at working completely alone! I am a people person, a team player! I really dislike working on something that I have to dream up, plan, research, and handle all the details for all by myself.
I was so desperate to do anything but work on my thesis this morning that I spent the entire first half of the day cleaning the house and doing my laundry – two things I dislike almost as much as I dislike going to the dentist. Writing this post is the last non-thesis related thing I am doing today, so here’s to another day of writing!
Here I am again, enjoying another tasty recipe thanks to my wandering mind. About a half hour ago I had to stop what I was doing because the protests from my stomach were becoming distracting. A quick look at the sparse offerings in our pantry, freezer, and refrigerator kicked my mind into high gear for some creative problem solving (it also made me wonder why I ever decided to go part-time, but that’s another tale for another day…).
Problem: Need food. Tasty food.
Solution: Think like grandma and work with what ya got.
Now, I don’t want to think exactly like grandma – as sweet and nurturing as she was, she was a terrible cook. This woman would literally ruin something as simple as buttered noodles – noodles that have been boiled and tossed with some butter. Ruined. I’ve seen it with my own eyes.
But as a woman with little financial means, she sure knew how to use what she had on hand. I have been witness to many a casserole, whipped up in a matter of minutes from last week’s leftovers, this week’s leftovers, milk about to go bad, brick cheese, noodles, rice-a-roni, and eggs. She was a pro at throwing stuff together. The problem was that it very very very rarely tasted good. She was lucky that my step-grandpa adored her so much that he had his taste buds burned off (ok, so that may have been an embellishment, but we did often wonder how he could stand it).
Leftovers don’t last in our house since we take them in to work with us the next day, so I just stuck with hunting for what I had that sounded like it wouldn’t be too terrible. I found linguine, peas, milk, parmesan cheese, imitation lobster, and cream cheese and decided I had what I needed for a decent alfredo sauce. It isn’t gourmet, but tasty enough for me! In honor of my grandma, I named it:
Esther’s Super-fast Seafood Alfredo
2 servings
2Tbsp butter (but I really think this can be substituted with olive oil, and possibly even cut in half)
1 tsp garlic powder (don’t skimp on this one!)
4 oz cream cheese (I used the 1/3 less fat version)
1 cup of milk (I used 2%)
About 3 oz parmesan cheese
Pepper to taste (preferable freshly ground).
1 small package imitation lobster or crab
Noodles of your choice – about 4-6 oz
About 1 cup of peas or whatever other vegetable you’ve got that would go well
Get the water going for your noodles. While that gets started, melt the butter in a medium saucepan.
When the butter is melted, add the garlic powder and cream cheese. Whisk until smooth.
Start whisking the milk in, little by little until smooth. Add the parmesan cheese and pepper and again whisk until smooth. Taste the sauce. Is something missing? Add it. Cook until it reaches your desired consistency.
Add the peas to the noodles for the last 2-3 minutes of cooking time. Drain. Add the imitation lobster to the sauce and heat through. Toss the noodles and peas in with sauce and you are done!
After a rough night that was filled with some bad news on top of the realization that I am not even close to completing all the reading I need to do, I have decided to create a really good outline and just dive in and write! The past two weeks I have had a hard time getting through the journal articles I have been reading. They are written by experts for experts, so it is perfectly reasonable for a student (not yet an expert) to struggle.
But…I probably could have pushed myself more during the past two weeks – there was opportunity, but I didn’t always take it (to my credit, I sometimes made the choice to read instead of watch another episode of The Walking Dead).
I may be a little behind, but hey, like Rick Grimes, I’ve been doing stuff…things…
During my two-year hiatus from school, it seems I have forgotten how much work it actually is. That no matter how tired I am, I need to head back to the office after I eat dinner and get back to reading/taking notes/writing/trying not to fall asleep and drool on the keyboard.
I also didn’t realize how much I appreciated my relaxation time before bed at night – watching a favorite show or two while sipping a glass of cabernet and nibbling on some dark chocolate. It has been a difficult transition, giving that time up. And the wine…definitely the wine – I am convinced that when this is all over and I have my degree in hand, my tolerance will be so low that just a whiff of some whisky and I will be boiled as an owl!
And now I am reaping what I sowed…I will likely be sending an imperfectly written, not-quite-finished-yet draft exactly at 1:59 AM (the latest I can submit and be considered on time). Luckily, I have done enough reading of the literature that I feel I can read as I go and still do a quality job. Regardless, a draft is due tonight, no matter what shape it is in. I hope to have it in fairly decent form before I turn it in, so without further ado…let the marathon writing session begin!
Woohoo!! I was so excited, I had to dig out the glitter pony for this one. The deadline for my next chapter is coming up on Monday, and I have a lot of work to do on it yet, so I was worried that my proposal would come back needing a 2nd draft.
But it didn’t. And the comments I received were ego-boosting, which always helps me (yes, this means I often need outside approval for my actions because the voices in my head don’t like me very much…but hey, who doesn’t like to be told nice things about their work?).
In keeping with the theme of my avoidist ways and unicorn banner, I was pretty excited to find out that other bloggers occasionally write about unicorns and glitter. While I was searching for ways to avoid the reading I should be doing, I found this post by a blogger I have been following for a while, and had to share:
It’s my blog and I can food if I want to. And yes, I just used “food” as a verb. I’m feeling a little Bucky Katt-ish today. Though I’m not sure if that means I am feeling sassy…or ignorant. Let’s go with sassy.
Back to why I am posting a recipe. All weekend I have been doing a great job avoiding the tremendous amount of reading I have to do. Even when you are interested in the topic, scholarly articles are just not fun to read. But today when I woke up, I told myself that I was going to be a reading rockstar.
Then I remembered that I told a friend I would cheer him on in the local marathon. So out the door I went, without breakfast or coffee or tea. I cheered him on at the halfway point, then quick high-tailed it to the 18 mile mark. On the way home, I thought Ok, NOW you can be a reading rockstar.
But when I got home, I remembered that I hadn’t had any breakfast. And my slight headache was letting me know that I better make some coffee, too (caffeine can help headaches). So, I started getting my breakfast together, got the burr grinder and Aeropress out for the coffee…when I realized that what I really wanted was a pumpkin spice latte. But since I didn’t know how to make one, I had to look up a recipe first.
Of course, none of the recipes matched the ingredients I had on hand. On a normal day, I might have considered running to the grocery store to buy all the necessary ingredients. Today, however, I decided that since I had pumpkin spice syrup on hand, I would mix and match the recipes to come up with my own – and it was tasty! Here it is:
Pumpkin Spice Latte
2 shots of espresso or 1/2 cup of strong coffee
1 cup of milk (or however much you like in your latte), heated
1tsp-ish (I don’t measure) Pumpkin Spice Syrup (I like Torani)
1tsp-ish Vanilla Bean Syrup (you can use vanilla extract to taste, also)
A bit of sugar – what kind you use doesn’t matter, but I like to use German rock sugar
Pumpkin spices blend – I don’t know how much I used, but I suspect it was about 1/2 tsp or so.
Make the coffee. Put it in a cup. It doesn’t matter how you make the coffee. Just make it how you like it. I like the strong coffee that the Aeropress makes, and I like to use fancy-schmancy whole bean coffees. But if you like Folgers in a drip maker, then use that.
To the coffee, add the syrups and spice blend.
Heat the milk. Whip it, whisk it, or if you have one of those frothers, use it. *Side note: I have noticed that 1% milk doesn’t froth. Skim and 2% seem to do fine* Frothing isn’t necessary, so if you just want to heat the milk and leave it at that, that’s fine.
Add the milk to the coffee and drink.
I will not make the claim that this is better than Starbucks, because it isn’t. But it IS healthier (much less syrup, no whipped cream) and WAY cheaper. And I thought it was very tasty.
My empty cup.
Enjoy! I have to get back to being a reading rockstar…
I suppose you could say that taking the time to learn something about yourself is not, in fact, an act of avoidance. Many may see it as a way of facing whatever it is you are avoiding deep down – your true fears and temptations. Your cryptonite.
And of course it can help you face what you are dealing with – existential angst, problems identifying how you feel, dissatisfaction with career/spouse/social life, etc. This is especially true when you first begin the journey of getting to know yourself. It is thrilling to find out that everything you feel inside, everything you are is not alone in this world. There are people out there that can relate you and all your quirks and foibles.
Now don’t get mad and tell me that Mr. Rogers told you that you were special or unique. He told me, too. It wasn’t a dirty lie. You are special. You are unique. But you are not alone. Being able to relate to another person is not the same as being a carbon copy.
My getting-to-know-me journey has been one of the most trying and fulfilling of my life. I was pent-up, frustrated, oppressed, passive-aggressive, unable to identify my feelings, hated my job, and always wanted to run away (I mean physically pack a few bags, take whatever $ I could out of the bank and tell the world to suck my tailpipe). I had a wonderful friend recommend that I start looking at myself to deal with my unhappiness, rather than looking at others. Now, she was not at all saying that I was to blame for it all, rather she was helping me figure out how to deal with it in the best way for me. I can change myself. I can’t change others.
So I dug out my old Meyers-Briggs personality test results I had from when I took it at 19. I took the test again. Same results. In a decade plus 7, I hadn’t changed who I was inside. But I somehow had become someone I didn’t like very much.
After that eye-opener, I started taking every test I could find, reading up on my results and the results of all the other personality types so I could try to figure out which type my spouse/boss/friends/colleagues might be. I started talking in alphabet soup (“If I’m an ENFP and he’s an ISTJ…or could he be an INTJ…”). It took a while, but eventually everything started to click (thanks, again to that friend I mentioned earlier).
A few friends and I started to read some books that challenged the part of me that didn’t want to let go of the person I had become. Practical Genius and The Artist’s Way helped me start to lay the foundation of a plan to better my life and myself while I kept delving into my psyche. The deeper I went, the more I dealt with and the more peaceful I became.
I quit my job. I started standing up for myself. I became more honest with myself and others about my feelings (by the way, when you do this, you have no need to be passive-aggressive). And now the only running I want to do is to the border for a margarita.
So what does this have to do with avoidance? Now that I have spent so much time digging into the inner-workings of me, I am eager to know more even if I have many other things to do. It has been an important part of my life, and while I intend for this to be a lifelong journey, I should probably get back to working on my thesis…
In case you are curious, here are my results from the various tests I have taken:
The Art of Avoidance 