How do you overcome perfectionism, procrastination, and fatigue? Or more concerning, What do you do when you face writing anxiety that goes beyond “normal”? Based on personal experience, studies of post-traumatic stress recovery, and the work of University of Houston professor, Brené Brown, this webinar walks you through the issues underlying these common challenges. This presentation then offers practical how-to’s to overcome stressful or traumatic writing/feedback experiences to develop writing resilience and perseverance to achieve your potential.
Writing Scared: How to Overcome the Perfectionism, Procrastination & Fatigue That Get in the Way of Your Writing
1. HOW TO OVERCOME THE
PERFECTIONISM,
PROCRASTINATION & FATIGUE
THAT GET IN THE WAY OF YOUR
WRITING
PhD Candidate, History
Creator of Dissertators United Writing Boot Camps
Ashley
Sanders
(Writing Scared)
2. What we’re talking about today…
What is writing anxiety?
Common Effects
How it feels
Common Causes
Why do we experience it?
What do we do about it?
Q&A
C. Jorge Cham 7/23/2014
http://phdcomics.com/comics/archive.php
?comicid=1733
Accessed: 27 September 2014
3. Can you identify with the
following?
C. Jorge Cham 7/23/2014. http://phdcomics.com/comics/archive.php?comicid=1733
Accessed: 27 September 2014
4. Have you ever…
Experienced a writing block?
Procrastinated on a writing project?
Had to clean the house, repaint your room, [insert
any other stalling tactic] before you could start
writing?
Felt terror grip your heart when submitting writing to
a professor or a colleague?
Worried that you wouldn’t be able to organize your
ideas coherently?
Felt anxious about how others would respond to
your writing?
Conflated the quality of your writing with your
worth?
6. Signs & Symptoms of Anxiety
Source:
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Signs_and_Symptoms_of_Anxiety,_Wikiversity_Motivation_and_emotion,_Slide_2.jpg
Used under CC license
7. What is Writing Anxiety?
C. Jorge Cham 7/28/2014 (http://phdcomics.com/comics/archive.php?comicid=1734)
Accessed 27 September 2014.
8. Common Causes
Fear
Perfectionism
Magical thinking
Confusion about
department or
committee
expectations
Perception/reality?
Insufficient data or
sources
9. Perfectionism & Procrastination:
Two sides of the same coin
C. Jorge Cham 9/3/2014 (http://phdcomics.com/comics/archive.php?comicid=1740) Accessed 27 September
2014.
10. Perfectionism
Four Signs of Perfectionism
Setting very high standards and placing high importance on
these standards. Feeling that you will be a second rate
person if you do not live up to these standards
Preoccupation with details, rules, lists, order, and
organization.
Concern and negative reactions to mistakes. Having a
tendency to interpret mistakes as failure and believing that
you will lose the respect of others for your mistakes.
Doubting your ability to do a task.
NOTE: Perfectionism is not to be mistaken for effort and desire for excellence
What’s at the root? Fear.
We are more than our academic writing; it does not
define us.
We must believe we are enough, even as we work to
improve and refine our skills.
Source: Susan Meindl, “Grad School Perfectionism Creates Stress, Anxiety and Depression Rather than Excellence,”
http://EzineArticles.com/2210275.
12. Procrastination
Endlessly reading and taking notes
Obsessive and never-ending “Planning”
Doing seemingly important, urgent tasks
rather than write
Unnecessary preparation (Do you really
need to sharpen 20 pencils?)
Complete avoidance – cleaning the
house, watching TV (instead of working
during work time)
What’s at the root? Fear.
We are more than our academic writing; it
does not define us.
We must believe we are enough, even as we
work to improve and refine our skills.
13. What do we do?
First Steps
Calming music
Calming sounds
(ocean waves, rain,
white noise)
Deep breathing
exercises
Meditation
Journal about your
writing anxiety 15
min a day for 4
days.
Contact your
counseling center on
campus to begin
processing and
moving beyond the
trauma
Contact your
ombudsmen or
Graduate School
(administration) if you
are experiencing any
kind of abuse
How to reduce physiological
response to anxiety:
Stop the academic hazing and
abuse
14. What do we do?
Create a toolbox!
Use grounding techniques:
Identify everything in your space that is
{color}
Set a timer for 5 minutes and just focus on
your breath, noticing each inhale/exhale
Say kind statements, as if you were talking
to your best friend: “You are a good person
going through a hard time. You’ll get through
this.”
Repeat a favorite mantra
Describe in detail a time when you felt your
writing flowed well and you received positive
feedback on it
Hold a physical object (small stone, book,
phone, pen) and pay attention to how it feels
in your hand
15. What do we do?
Create a toolbox!
Find a picture that
represents
calm/peace for you
and put it where you
can see it while
writing
BSDR Player
Relax M.P. –
Concentration
Binaural Beats
Create a writing
playlist
16. What do we do?
Create a toolbox!
Make permission slips for
yourself
Write out & repeat
positive affirmations
17. What do we do?
Create a toolbox!
Free-write
Pomodoros
Make a list of favorite
writing warm-ups:
Journal
Visual thinking (mindmap,
sketch)
New vocab
Read about writing (Write Your
Dissertation in 15 Minutes a
Day; Writing Your Journal
Article in 12 Weeks, etc.)
18. What do we do?
Create routines
1. Do something you
find calming for 5-10
minutes
2. Set your
intention/goal for
your writing session
& share with your
accountability
partner
3. Choose & complete
your favorite writing
warm-up
4. Set your timer and
get started!
5. Use grounding
techniques and free-writing
when anxiety
rises
6. When your session
is over, make note of
what worked well &
what you
accomplished
7. Fill out your writing
log & note what to
work on tomorrow
8. Reward yourself!
19. What do we do?
Organize…
Find or start a writing group
Share your writing OFTEN! (especially
your rough – read chaotic, f*&!$’d-up –
drafts)
Find an accountability partner
Create a timeline and share it with
your committee and ask them to hold
you to it.
Create a personal support system
20. What do we do?
Resources
Reading
On Trauma:
Trauma Resource
Institute
National Institute of
Mental Health: PTSD
International Society for
Traumatic Stress
Studies
The Perils of
Perfectionism
For more information
on EMDR therapy,
check out:
EMDR Institute, Inc.
Brené Brown’s Books &
Talks:
I Thought it Was Just Me
(but it isn’t): Making the
Journey from ‘What will
people think?’ to ‘I am
enough’
The Gifts of Imperfection:
Let Go of Who You Think
You’re Supposed to Be
and Embrace Who You
Are.
Brené Brown’s TED talks
21. What do we do?
Resources – Apps & More
Apps More Tips
BSDR Player (Bilateral Sounds
Desensitization and
Reprocessing)- This app is $9.99
and available for
both iPhones and Android.
iChill: This free app is available
for
both iPhones and Android and
provides guided steps to bring
you back into the present and out
of a panicked state.
Relax M.P. (Premium) ($2.99):
This app is also available for
both iPhones and the link in the
title takes you the Google Play
Store for Android devices. I’ve
found the Concentration Beta
waves really helpful in promoting
focus for set periods of time.
Writing prompts in this
worksheet will help you
recognize your physiological
response to stressors.
Practice mindfulness
meditation.
Try an app like Rest and
Relax ($0.99 on both iPhones
and Android) if you’re just
getting started
Meditation Oasis (iTunes
podcast)
Eva Lantsoght’s GradHacker
article.
UCLA also has an excellent
podcast series of mindfulness
meditations (search iTunes)
22. Finally… stick to it!
This is not easy.
You have to stick to it
and surround yourself
with supportive,
understanding people.
Don’t be surprised by
the roller coaster.
It will get better!
http://phdcomics.com/comics/archive.php?comicid=1733
C. Jorge Cham 7/23/2014
Accessed: 27 September 2014
Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM) is the standard classification of mental disorders used by mental health professionals
What this does… Prolonged stress (more then 30-60 minutes) begins to break down the essential connections the hippocampus makes. This is the only region of the brain responsible for making new neurons, connections across our brain, controlling our emotions, and retaining new information. Too much cortisol (one of the hormones released when under stress) begins to literally kill brain cells! “Over a period of time, all of this results in the shrinking in size of the hippocampus with associated declines in cognitive function, including the ability to retain new information and adapt to novel situations.” (Gregory Kellett, http://sharpbrains.com/blog/2008/02/05/stress-and-neural-wreckage-part-of-the-brain-plasticity-puzzle/) Kellet is a researcher at UCSF where he currently investigates the psychophysiology of social stress.
However the effects of stress on the brain can not only be stopped but reversed! Good news for all of us in academia, right?
http://phdcomics.com/comics/archive.php?comicid=1734
C. Jorge Cham 7/28/2014
Accessed 27 September 2014
Magical thinking: our neurotic rituals that we turn to when we feel we have no control over our writing or its reception. (Earth to writer: we don’t have any control over others’ perceptions, however, we have complete control over our text, our writing practice, and the revision process.)
Perfectionism is grounded in fear often leads to procrastination and writing blocks and then to panic
http://phdcomics.com/comics/archive.php?comicid=1740
C. Jorge Cham 9/3/2014
Accessed 27 September 2014
Susan Meindl, “Grad School Perfectionism Creates Stress, Anxiety and Depression Rather than Excellence,” http://EzineArticles.com/2210275
http://phdcomics.com/comics/archive.php?comicid=1735
C. Jorge Cham 8/6/2014
Accessed 27 September 2014
Yes, I know that the whole positive affirmations sounds really cheesy, too simple and that it couldn’t possibly work. Psychologists have found over and over again that it does though. And I’ll warn you that you’ll feel really silly and doubt its effectiveness at first until one day, you find yourself actually believing those positive statements and the compliments others give you.
For those who have experience prolonged stress (pretty much every grad student), check out the research and resources for those who have experienced trauma – many of them are applicable. It’s not being melodramatic, as I would have thought before I gave it a try. Even if you’re skeptical, give the links above a shot. It certainly cannot hurt. Brené Brown is a shame and vulnerability researcher at the University of Houston. Her work is transformative. Read through her books slowly and journal along the way or get the cliff notes version in her talks and interviews.
Magical thinking: our neurotic rituals that we turn to when we feel we have no control over our writing or its reception. (Earth to writer: we don’t have any control over others’ perceptions, however, we have complete control over our text, our writing practice, and the revision process.)