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Top Tips (what I know now that I wish I had known then) Please add!

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Top Tips (what I know now that I wish I had known then) Please add!

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I seem to have learned very slowly about study, especially writing academically. Here are some of the things that I have learnt. Use the comment function below to add your "tips"

Yasmin

1. Write little and often

2. Learn about your own writing habits and time cycles - I try to use times when I have some energy to tackle weightier writing tasks, like theorising or working out my argument/narrative. I use my lower energy times to do referencing and basic proof-reading

3. Body doubling - writing with a buddy can be a real boost and a discipline (this technique started with neurodiverse  people). The method I use is to start a session with a friend where we each say what we want to do that day ("I need to start this article" or "I need to restructure this"). We then set a timer for 25 minutes. When the time timer goes off we stop, take a couple of mins to have a break and say what we just did and then carry on with the same cycle. Having a sense of accountability has been valuable to me (as well as going somewhere that doesn't have wifi!)

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A part of why study and learning can be intimidating is because of how study, reading and writing can seem to be about “mastering”, or what anti-colonial scholars have called firsting. So don’t worry if you feel you haven’t mastered what you are studying, get curious about what these feelings might point to.

Firsting is a deep and filigreed anti-colonial discussion, Max Liboiron has brought some of these discussions together in this blog post:

https://discardstudies.com/2021/01/18/firsting-in-research/

For a parallel, queer theory discussion, take a look at what Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick calls "weak theory" (1997):

Sedgwick, Eve Kosofsky 1997 "Paranoid Reading and Reparative Reading: Or, You're so Paranoid, You Probably Think this Introduction Is about You." In Novel Gazing: Queer Readings in Fiction, ed. Eve Sedgwick, 1-40. Durham, N.C.: Duke University Press.

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The push towards mastering knowledge is also about education policies. In the UK context, this has been seen in how schools have been obliged to teach to tests, so that knowledge becomes fragmented into nuggets that have to be learnt and manipulated. At the same time, its important to take great care and pride in how you read and write. Will Davis has a great article in the London Review of Books that discusses why plagiarism has seemingly grown in universities and theorises some of the connections to broader structural issues

https://www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v44/n04/william-davies/how-many-words-does-it-take-to-make-a-mistake

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Just One Thing  - Michael Mosley

This is the title of a BBC 4 radio programme, in which Dr Michael Mosley looks at one thing you can include in your daily routines that can enhance health. I like the way the focus on something ‘small’ makes change seem more possible and doesn’t set us up to fail. The advice won’t suit everyone, but perhaps choose something that you like the sound of and give it a try.

*the text below has been edited from the BBC site

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/articles/4vnJt52qklgX6fyxWGRcY7M/12-easy-ways-to-improve-your-health-this-summer

1. Drink water

The old eight glasses of water a day myth can seem unachievable, but it’s actually not based on any evidence. The general guidance is to drink a glass of water with every meal – much easier!

2. Get some sun

Sun can increase your brain’s release of serotonin, which boosts your mood and helps you feel calm and focused.

3. Go for an early morning walk

Apparently, if you expose yourself to bright light early in the day, you can bring forward your body clock, so you are more ready to go to sleep at night.

4. Hang out in green spaces

Recent research suggests that spending a total of 120 minutes in nature per week is the ideal length of time to maximise benefits such as lowering your cortisol levels, and therefore stress. This idea is also a part of Chinese Traditional Medicine

5. Have a cold shower

Cold water causes short-term stress, which is thought to kickstart the body and gives you a high from increased dopamine, serotonin and b-endorphin levels. Studies have also shown that cold water can boost your immune system and could potentially help with conditions from rheumatism to depression.

6. Read a novel

Fiction it seems is the best way to lower stress (more than listening to music or doing nothing!) because it helps focus your attention outwards and away from yourself. It can also be a great resource for people with symptoms of depression.

7. Meditate

A small amount of practice each day can improve your sleep, mood, boost your immune system and even physically rewire your response to stress and pain.

8. Take a nap

Having a nap during the day can minimise your risk of heart attack, heart failure or stroke & boost your memory and your ability to learn new information. Longer naps (90 minutes or more) may give you deeper benefits, but even 5-20 minutes could help you feel more alert.

9. Think yourself stronger

Research suggests that you can improve your strength just by thinking about it! Visualisation is a technique used by top athletes in a range of activities from rugby to tennis, and it can even help you run faster.

10. Get some houseplants

Houseplants can be a great way to purify the air and minimise indoor air pollution. And greenery can help you concentrate better; one study showed that when employees could view plants from their desk, they performed better in a specific test of concentration by 19%.

11. Exercise in short bursts

It seems that short bursts of activity – can be as good for you as one 30-minute session.

12. Take a break
Letting your mind wander seems to be beneficial with improvements for creative thinking, mood, decision-making and mental resilience. Even a microbreak of 3 minutes can be good. Plus, it’s good for your eyes to look away from a screen.

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If you could do with a breather, here is a short meditation (under 8 minutes) that I use regularly. It is guided by Dora Kamau, who is also a psychiatric nurse. “Don’t forget your breath” is an invitation to slow down thinking and reconnect.

Insight Timer is a free app with thousands of meditation practices. There doesn't seem to be much quality control, so I try to follow those practitioners, like Dora, who are skilled and sensitive. You can also find teachers from universities like UCLA and the Oxford Mindfulness Centre on the app.

https://insighttimer.com/dorakamau/guided-meditations/dont-forget-your-breath

Mark Williams (Oxford) is a clinical psychologist and developed Mindfulness Based Cognitive Therapy. Here is one of his breath-based practices

https://insighttimer.com/markwilliams/guided-meditations/mindfulness-of-body-and-breath-3

This loving kindness meditation is from the UCLA Mindfulness Research Centre: https://insighttimer.com/ucla/guided-meditations/loving-kindness-meditation

The Centre has audio guided meditations in different languages on its website, including Arabic, Cantonese and Mandarin:

https://www.uclahealth.org/uclamindful/guided-meditations

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Something for when …. you might be feeling a little lost or lonely, or may want to take a moment to open up to wonder. This poem by Mary Oliver is a beautiful reminder of your precious place in our queer “family of things”

Mary Oliver – Wild Geese

You do not have to be good.
You do not have to walk on your knees
for a hundred miles through the desert repenting.
You only have to let the soft animal of your body
love what it loves.
Tell me about despair, yours, and I will tell you mine.
Meanwhile the world goes on.
Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain
are moving across the landscapes,
over the prairies and the deep trees,
the mountains and the rivers.
Meanwhile the wild geese, high in the clean blue air,
are heading home again.
Whoever you are, no matter how lonely,
the world offers itself to your imagination,
calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting -
over and over announcing your place
in the family of things.

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For something that speaks more directly to the experience of research, I love this extract from Ruth Behar's "The Vulnerable Observer: Anthropology That Breaks Your Heart (1996):

"Loss, mourning, the longing for memory, the desire to enter into the world around you and having no idea how to do it,

the fear of observing too coldly or distractedly or too raggedly, the rage of cowardice, the insight that is always arriving too late, as defiant hindsight, a sense of the utter uselessness of writing anything and yet the burning desire to write something, are the stopping places along the way. At the end of the voyage, if you are lucky, you catch a glimpse of a lighthouse, and you are grateful. Life, after all, is bountiful. (p. 3)