On the good days, I don't have to call anyone's help desk.
We won't talk about the bad ones.
This grind is rough, because in theory, most of us also have regular jobs. I, for example, have to give a brand new talk tomorrow for my center. I also have a recently rejected article that has to be resubmitted so I don't have to edit my job materials to say "Not Under Review, Because I'm Too Freaking Busy Calling Your IT Department." Also, the downside of my excited I-WON-A-GRANT moment this summer is that for the first time in my academic life, I have serious deadlines. The kind that cannot be negotiated, pushed-back, sweet-talked, or ignored.
So, how do we keep going in the midst of all of this?
I realized that in the course of business and grad school, I picked up a few tricks that you might find helpful when your to-do list is too long for your legal-sized notepad. So despite having been on the job market for a grand total of about one week, I am giving my non-expert advice for those foolish/bored/naive enough to read it.
1. Start with the easiest thing possible. Momentum is crucial when you're this busy, so find the easiest or most appealing thing and go for it. For me, that is often the job ap that requires the fewest materials (and therefore the least amount of brain power). But sometimes, it is mindlessly updating my job ap spreadsheet with new postings, so I'm organized and feel on top of things. This is my sure-fire way to get started when I'm about to throw a "But I don't wanna go to bed!" 8 year-old style tantrum.
2. Don't Look At Your To-Do List. Maybe, don't even write one. If you're anything like me, your brain is probably already going into overdrive thinking about all of the things you have to do. So unless you are in serious danger of actually forgetting something important, ignore the list. Why? Because you don't need to be a big picture person right now. You need to be a little picture person, who is focused on exactly one thing. And that one thing is whatever you need to be doing right now to make a dent in your pile. You don't need to know how big that pile is or how big of a dent you're making, you simply need to begin shoveling. You can look back at the end of the day and survey your progress. But you do not need to waste your un-tired brain power constantly reminding yourself of how much more you have to go.
3. If you're completely panicking, Stop Working Now. If you're having a strong emotional reaction of any kind, it's important to bring that reactivity down before even attempting to be productive (because chances are, trying to be productive is part of what is making you freak out). I am a big fan of yoga, I am a big fan of finding a short guided meditation online, and I am a big fan of really abysmal reality TV. I am also big on anything that relies on my hands rather than my brain, to help bring me out of that head space. Gardening, cooking, cleaning are all good candidates. As your heart-rate and brain waves return to something closer to normal, you'll be better able to focus on the task at hand. And that means you won't be going in circles, stressed about not making progress, because, whew, after a break, ta-da! You can make progress again. It's counter-intuitive, but to get more work done, I often have to try to do less.
4. Take a look at your non-work life. This affects our work life more than anything. The basics must always be attended to. Are you getting enough sleep? Are you getting enough social time? Are you getting enough alone time? What about exercise? Are you eating like you're on a rock-star tour bus or like you're trying to support your health? How much coffee and how much alcohol has been in your system in the last twenty-four hours, and is it an amount you'd be ashamed to admit to your doctor? If someone asked you what your hobbies were, would you be able to look back on your last week as evidence that you have any? All of these things are more important than work, if work is important to you.
5. Evaluate stressors. This can be work or non-work related. For me, often interpersonal things stress me out more than other things. But it doesn't matter what exhausts you, if there are things going on in your life that can be put on hold, or removed entirely, it's time to make that judgment call. Maybe this sounds harsh... but a lot of us keep people and things around that we don't need, long after they stop serving us. If you have a friend who is always facing the end of the world, and calls you up frequently to remind you, and you haven't had the guts to have a real heart-to-heart with her or yourself about how this makes you feel... now may be the time. It may be the time to have the conversation, or to acknowledge you are never going to be able to have that conversation, and move on with every ounce of well-wishing and kindness you can muster. Because you can't do it all, you can't be it all, and it's not your job to. Remember, you must put on your own oxygen mask before assisting others.
6. Pay attention to your work flow, and track it. You can do this formally and compulsively in a spreadsheet, or you can just keep an eye on it. Some people work best when they have a set amount of writing or something to do each day. Routine is king. Others, like me, are utterly unable to keep a routine and actually become less productive when we try. I pay attention to when I work well, what the conditions were like, and what the aftermath was. One day this week, I cranked out four job applications. I felt amazing. But I was so tired that the next day, I didn't do anything until 4pm. That's a situation where it's important to ask yourself: Did I do too much? What is the right amount for me? Since I know I am more of a sprinter than a long-distance runner, I assume that after super productive days, I will need rest time. And I count this as part of my productivity needs. I never try to sit down the next morning and do four more applications. But if you're a routine person, doing two applications each day might be a better fit. On the third day, we all have to get up and do more work, so see what allows you to get to that place. Pay attention. Study yourself. Make adjustments accordingly. What works for other people is irrelevant, except to the extent that it gives you new strategies to experiment with. And once you start paying attention to what garners you your best work flows, you will be fighting less of an uphill battle, because you'll be working within your natural rhythm. If you're going to sustain ultra-productivity, you need to find the path of least resistance to do so. Don't try to swim with your jeans on.
7. Laugh. Take breaks for this. It releases good hormones. It reminds you that there is in fact a world outside of you and what you're stressed about. And there is. An entire world.
8. Keep perspective. After a few months on my job, a director asked me why I kept referring to myself as only being there for a year, when I had a two-year position. "Well, people told me that when they go on the job market in the fall, they don't have time for anything else. So really, I only have this one year to get things done, before that starts." He looked at me and said "you can't afford to look at it like that."
Because, guess what... I am only going to get one job at the end of this! Not ten. Not five. One. And my CV is never going to list the other five, twenty, or hundred other applications I submit. Yes, send in good materials. Care about it. But check yourself. If you're planning on being around in a year, think about how that future you would want you to spend your time now too. That future you might want you to remember other things outside of job aps exist.
9. Keep perspective, part II. A lot of people have asked me what kind of job I want. This is my most articulate answer: "I'd like to do some research, some teaching, and run something maybe too. And I want my co-workers to be nice. And I want to live somewhere I can like." I have applied for some jobs so far, and I cannot for the life of me tell you which of those jobs actually meets these preferences. I know I didn't apply for anything farther South than I already am. Beyond that, I don't know. And the truth is that I don't need to know. I don't need to spend time now weighing their relative merits or imagining myself on their campus. That can come later, much, much later, when it's an actual decision on the table. So be here, now. More what-ifs won't buy you anything. You do not need to accumulate them.
Someone asked me yesterday what schools I'd applied to, or even how many. And I could barely answer the former, and was completely at a loss for the latter. I would have to open up excel to answer those questions. But fortunately, excel can hold on to that information for me, so I don't have to.There is a Buddhist teaching for this: "abandon all hope of fruition." Write a letter to write a good letter, but then let it go. Imagine that you write these letters for no other purpose than to write them, that no one hires you, and try to find peace in that feeling. If you can feel good without your dream job, you are infinitely more likely to be happy in it.
10. Compartmentalize. It's true, the task will expand to fit the time allotted. You can go about this in two ways. You can be one of those rock stars who turns things in early "I will apply to NYU 14 days before the deadline to ensure full consideration and perhaps, gratitude, from the search committee." And then, voila, you have effectively decreased the time allotted. Or, if you are slightly more human than that and struggle to take self-imposed deadlines seriously... leave a small window to turn your applications in and make it work to your advantage. If you have three applications due Friday, maybe Monday and Tuesday are best spent turning that article around. Find the things that don't have real deadlines, and take care of them before your deadline-tasks. Compartmentalize so that your deadline-dependent tasks don't expand to fit all of the time allotted on the history of the earth. This applies x1000 to teaching.
11. Ask yourself why on earth you're reading a blog post about productivity, because maybe you're already perfectly productive enough. And you just need to take a moment to see that, instead of trying to be more or better or faster or anything else but exactly what you are.
I have to say, I have met many ambitious people in my life, and I have yet to meet a single one who seems to have a good reason for being so driven. No judgment. I have been ambitious at times too. But I think it's important that we all ask ourselves what we think will be so spectacularly different when we achieve that next big level of "success." I think we lie to ourselves a lot that we just have to get through this one more hectic time, and then it will be easier... and in doing this, our lives slip away, as we wait for this mythical later time to appear. How is having a tenure-track job or a prestigious fellowship really going to change how you feel in your day-to-day life? Will you really finally heave a sigh of relief, and kick back and smell roses and kiss babies? What are you going after? Feeling good enough? Smart enough? Rich enough? Important enough? Happy enough? What is missing now in your life that will be so completely different afterwards?
These can be hard questions to answer, but important ones. Because once we know why we are striving so hard, and pushing so much, we can begin to check in and say "wait, am I really going to achieve X if I do this?"
I acknowledge the allure of living above the poverty line. Are you kidding? I take my dog to PT every week. But I think ambition often goes much deeper. It's often about more than worrying about food on the table.
And whatever you don't have now, honestly, you will probably still not have when you get a fancy new job or a shiny new car. Have you ever noticed that often it's people with the most money who seem constantly stressed that they don't have enough? "More" doesn't resolve the issue, most of the time. Or that the people who feel the strongest need for approval spend the most time trying to fit in? Because they never feel like they do?
You're better off finding a way to cultivate good things in your life when you aren't surrounded by prestige and money and success, because then you might have some chance of holding onto them when you are.
Can you imagine, right now, in this moment, what it would feel like to relax and know in your bones that you have absolutely everything in the entire world that you want or need? Everything, and then some. Completely. It's already here.
I like to sit with that one.
I'd rather fill out job applications feeling like that than any other way. A job can just be a cherry on top of "already awesome."
And why should it be anything else?
Practice. It's there.
Namaste.
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