Why You Can Write Everything Except Your Dissertation

And you might be thinking like I was that if I just had a little bit more motivation, if I could be a little bit more consistent, then I would have this literature review done or whatever the chapter is that you're working on.

And it's like, how could I be working for an entire semester on a dissertation without finishing a single chapter, without having anything to show for it? Like, for instance, right now we're in October at the time of this recording.

Let's say you were like, I want to finish my literature review before Halloween.

And you've been working really hard the first couple of weeks of October.

Right.

You did exactly what I just described and you.

have been reading, you have the notes to show for it.

People see you, right? They see that you don't pick up the phone call.

They see you not going, you're not outside with them.

But then when you are sitting there trying to work on this literature review, you're spending more time asking yourself questions like, is this the right article? Does it really belong here? Is there a better citation? Am I explaining this correctly? What happens if I'm not thinking about it the right way? What if my questions are a little bit off? What if I just got the structure of this wrong? Why doesn't this sound like what I think the literature review should sound like? And so then you pause it and then you start going down, like, let me find some more articles.

Let me go talk to this person.

Let me meet with my chair just in case so they can look at this one more time.

And you're doing all these things, right? You're busy doing things.

But the thing is, most likely, Halloween is going to pass.

Thanksgiving is going to pass.

We're going to get to the end of this year and still be like, I haven't even finished this literature review, let alone this proposal.

And you're going to sit there with some form of question like, if I'm this consistent or if I'm working this hard and I still can't finish, maybe I don't have what it takes to write a dissertation or be a doctor.

I want you to know it's not that you're doing anything wrong.

You have everything that it takes to be a doctor.

You don't make it this far if you didn't have what it takes.

You're not doing the things though that will guarantee you become a doctor, meaning you're not writing words on the page.

You're doing everything but the one thing that will guarantee you to get to a finished document.

And it's not because you're not working hard enough.

Like, I really need you to hear me in this episode.

It has nothing to do with the hours or your commitment or citations.