I think we share a brain LOL! I have so much fear around writing that it's paralysing. I don't know where it comes from - probably fear of failure. I'm such a perfectionist too. I also have the fear that I don't know enough about what I'm writing. It's so frustrating. I just want to bang my head on a wall continuously.
YEP. TH-cam actually helped me get over that because I get to keep putting out content for the whole world to criticize and it's helped me get over that perfectionism and procrastination :P I was also always afraid to receive criticism from my supervisor which led to perfectionism. Because if it's not perfect then I could claim it wasn't done, and if it wasn't done I'd never have to submit it, and if I never submit it I can't get criticism. But now I just send what I have, even if it's bad, and that's what ends up making it better :) We are more than our writing! If it's not good, it doesn't mean that WE'RE not good!
Same here. I have completed all my experiments and writing has paralysed me to the point I now have convinced myself I need to re-do my experiments to collect more data. But like she said. Just write. So I will do that.
I passed! omg... thank you... I wanted to deregister so bad, and this video motivated me. I was doing my masters in Civil and environmental engineering. with 7 modules and research... I passed 6 and my research. not too bad while working full time. Just wanted to say thank you.
I find Sönke Ahrens' writing goal advice to be very encouraging. Instead of word count, he (or someone he quoted) suggested to have a goal of 3 permanent notes per day. This way the focus is on quality not quantity. But obviously you are in the next phase where you are using your existing notes.
🎯 Key Takeaways for quick navigation: 00:43 📝 *The writing technique of giving oneself prizes for reaching word goals, such as buying a skull shaver or barefoot running shoes, can be surprisingly effective in staying motivated during dissertation writing.* 01:28 📚 *The goal is to write 10,000 words in a week, requiring around 2,000 words per day. However, potential challenges include interruptions for additional research as ideas develop during the writing process.* 03:15 🖊️ *Writing in Obsidian, the speaker uses placeholders like "refer to x book" with a hashtag pencil emoji to remind themselves to revisit and expand on certain ideas during future writing sessions.* 04:10 🚫 *Overcoming barriers to writing includes dispelling the myths that one must know the entire dissertation topic beforehand, start writing from the beginning, or have read every relevant book before writing.* 06:12 🎤 *To facilitate writing, the speaker uses techniques like selecting a quote as a starting point, employing one-inch picture frames to narrow focus, and adopting a writing style that doesn't presume complete knowledge.* 08:46 📝 *Writing advice includes finishing writing when still in a flow to ease resumption, reading the previous day's work before starting, and creating a "zero draft" or raw version of the document before refining it.* 09:41 🗂️ *The concept of a "zero draft" involves getting all relevant thoughts, links, and potential sources onto the paper in any form, facilitating the subsequent creation of a polished first draft.* 11:33 🕒 *Starting writing early in the day is advised to leverage morning productivity. Establishing a writing habit, pairing it with another daily activity, and preparing materials in advance are additional recommendations to maintain consistency.* 15:57 📖 *Key advice includes writing truthfully and authentically, not succumbing to external pressures or voices, and continuing to read widely to enhance writing skills and find one's unique writerly voice.* 18:03 👥 *Utilizing the concept of "body doubling," working in the same space as someone else doing similar work, can enhance productivity and make the writing process more enjoyable.* 18:57 📚 *When facing challenges in writing, some find it helpful to study or work alongside productivity-focused TH-cam channels, like "merv," for motivation and focus.* 20:09 🤔 *To overcome writing blocks, remember your "why" - the personal motivation behind your work, like wanting to buy minimalist running shoes or create a compelling TH-cam video title.* 21:21 📝 *When struggling, consider reusing paragraphs from previous essays on similar topics, as a form of self-plagiarism can be acceptable when building on your own work.* 21:47 📖 *Look into other people's dissertations for inspiration on structure, formatting, and phrasing, especially when feeling stuck in the drafting phase.* 22:28 🖊️ *Take a break from digital writing and use pen and paper to jot down ideas, inspired by fiction writers who employ physical tools like sticky notes and colored pens for plotting.* 23:35 🌟 *Write about topics that genuinely excite you each day, as it helps maintain enthusiasm and may lead to more fluid and enjoyable writing.* 26:37 📅 *Plan PhD writing around other life commitments, as some individuals have found success by organizing their work around specific moments, such as when a baby is asleep.* 28:43 🌈 *Maintain other hobbies to balance PhD writing, preventing constant guilt and pressure, with physical activities like running recommended for keeping both body and mind active.* 30:06 📚 *Enhance writing skills by reading writing guides and advice books, such as Stephen King's "On Writing" or Joan Bolker's "Writing Your Dissertation in 15 Minutes a Day," for professional development in the field.* Made with HARPA AI
I just submitted my year 2 report of my four-year phd programme. It was a massive learning curve, 20k words, and everything in this vlog resonates SO DANG MUCH. Super insightful, relatable, and entertaining.
Your Obsidian note taking process has been super helpful for me and I realized that I was not taking notes efficiently. I would like to see a similar workflow of how you go from self-contained notes in Obsidian to academic writing. What kind of tools or tricks you use to structure your knowledge into a readable form.
Thanks! I'm in a PhD program, struggling with perfectionism, fear of failure, etc., etc. It helps to see how other people cope with it and the solutions they come up with to overcome it. Love and appreciate the channel!
Thank you so much for this engaging and informative video about PhD dissertation writing! I am about to reach my write-up stage of my PhD thesis and your tips are definitely helpful for me to get mentally prepared!
I just wanted to say I love your channel! It has a lot of genuinely helpful information on it, and it doesn't have the whole "toxic productivity" mindset I encounter in so many of these kinds of videos. I've started using Obsidian because of your video on that and I'm really loving it. Your vlogs are a lot of fun too. Thanks!
Yay, thanks for being here! I think the best way to be productive is to really enjoy what you're doing. Because then you don't even need to try to be productive. You WANT to do it, so you DO it! That's how my TH-cam channel keeps existing 😂 If I started doing it out of obligation or for someone else, I think I'd stop doing it.
so yesterday i watched this video after procrastinating and feeling overwhelmed just by STARTING to write my thesis: in my mind I had to have read every book, article, case study, pretty much everything lol that "just write" hit super hard lol but after many days in which i felt stuck i managed to pull off some solid work. i came back here to say thanks. I've been following you for a while (i discovered obsidian thanks to you) and yesterday this video and your work was super helpful. hopefully today will be productive as well. really, thanks for everything, and btw i gotta say you were rockin that buzzcut!!! ✊
This made me feel better. It's my first time writing anything over 4500 words and it is an unwieldy beast trying to pull everything together cohesively
I think I've never found a more helpful video on dissertation writing than this one. Thank you SO MUCH! I will try out the tips you gave myself as I'm struggling with getting words down on the page so often.
Oh, that's awesome, thanks for saying so! I guess I should re-watch this so I can remember what I was doing... :P Hopefully I can make another once I'm done my diss to say what actually ended up working the best long term!
So, I'm not a PhD student (at least, not yet. I am a undergraduate student) and I have no dissertation to write, but I am a huge nerd and I have my own academic blog. Of course not many people read what I write, its more of a self-fulfilling hobby, where I can craft my own research and delve into topics that interest me. It is also a source of accountability for me, I pay about 200$ a year for it. Despite that, your videos have still been so helpful for me. Your video on obsidian helped me understand the zettelkasten method better, when I first read Sonke the Zettelkasten method seemed bad to me. Now its my only method of note taking, and its so efficient! This video on writing a dissertation faster, has given me so many idea for writing blogs faster and better. I am so glad you exist, there is no other youtuber like you!
Thank you! And I'd love to check out your blog if you're willing to share it :) That's how I feel about my TH-cam channel (and also nobody watched it for the first 1.5 years). Like, making this video really helped my own motivation to do the writing. And I hope to start a blog someday soon, too!
TH-cam recomended me you channel and it was just what i needed to finish my final grad project, hopefully ill handle it better now since my schedules got messed up
I love how your 10,000 dissertation is apparently multi-platform as well ;) excellent work, thank you for posting this for us (though I am post-dissertations & a sci-fi novelist & museum painter). My life is just one big Anne Frank series of notes just call me professor notes.
I’ve been trying to finish my final chapter for months! I have the notes, I know the structure but for some reason I cannot put it together into coherent thoughts 😂😂 I set a permanent deadline of the first week of the new year so I needed to get going. this video is sooo helpful!
Shocking advice. I only watched forty-two seconds of your video, but I am shocked that from all the advice you've read that the number one piece of advice you gleaned was that you should write your thesis. Kudos.
You can do it!! It's totally possible! And remember the best dissertation is a done dissertation. It doesn't have to be good, it just has to be accepted 👍 (Although it's nice when we're also proud of it!)
Your points about writing constraints is so true. This is so true and applies to things in life as well. Love the zero draft idea - I have used "Miro" as sort of a random brain dump which I then bring into a zero draft - total stream of consciousness where I even put in aspirational elements - in this place thunder happens and I sell some point/idea. On Edit: Besides Obsidian - what is your workflow for writing? Editors, citational format tools, etc. Music (any playlists style as background, etc.)
I have a friend that also uses a miro-like software to create a network of various pieces of data and then basically just prints it all out linearly and rearranges things! So far, it goes like: 1. put everything into Obsidian as notes and organize those notes into maps of content. 2. Bring that all into Microsoft Word which is connected with Zotero and edit in there, with track changes on to get edits from my supervisor. But we'll see, I'm still in the early phases of writing :) And yes, I listen to music all the time while I work - changes depending on my mood! Always lyrical, though, I love lyrics
I don't have to do any academic writings anymore but this was very inspiring. I might read some of the books you recommended. Also I'm a fan of study with me vids, including Merve. They do help me get focused, too. And I have to tell you, I loved every outfit you wore✨
Thank you so much for this video! I've been working on my master's thesis for way too long (thanks to getting sick, but it's also 45k and that's quite daunting) and this video has really helped me to get out of my books and onto actually writing.
Thanks, I feel that many aspects are possible after watching your Video as I am abe to see you lead by example. You have changed my life for the better. Love and respect. Wish you a lovely life ahead.
Thank you girl!! Prizes are a great way to motivate me. I'm stuck and very scared of starting reading and writing my master thesis. At least 80 pages, I wanna cry.
That fear of starting is definitely one of the biggest hurdles to jump! Try to tell yourself you'll do it for just 5 minutes! Slowly build up the habit and you'll hopefully build up the confidence as you do! You can doooo it!! 🎉💪
@@morganeua ❤️ thank u. Ive just got back to the readings only 1 hour a day. I actually had started back in July 2022 but then got covid and afterwards I was sick for 6 months. Now I'm started to feel better but I feel so sad tthinking that I could've graduated by this time.
@@padmeasmr Oh no, I'm sorry to hear that! But you should be so proud of an hour a day, especially if it's academic reading. I honestly find it hard to do more than that in a day! I have to break up the reading with other tasks.
@@morganeua yeah me too cause you need so much focus! (I study philosophy and I'm reading in four languages lol). But I'm also taking notes that will make writing much easier even though it takes more time now. Usually I read for an hour and then switch to summarize the content, keywords and noting quotes. I'm slowly getting in the habit but I refuse to dedicate too much time to it. I remember writing my bachelor dissertation during the summer, every morning for a couple of hours and enjoy the rest of the day. It took me a couple of months to finish it without stress. I hope that works this time too 🤣😉 btw love your content and hairstyle hereee
I have no idea how to write a big piece of writing like 60,000 words. Yikes. But, I do know how to write smaller pieces and for me I divide and conquer. I like numbers... so, 1500 words divided by 3 sections divided by 2 subsections = 250 words per subsection, divided by 2 paragraphs per subsection = 125 words per paragraph. Oh yeah. Thats not scary and completely unsurmountable, except at midnight the night before it's due. My journey...
Yes, that's a great tactic! I know a lot of people work like that in the PhD, too. Like, they'll write a bunch of shorter articles to be published and then turn that into the dissertation. It's definitely easier to write 250 words than 60,000 words! :P
A bit late to the game to respond, but I thought I'd weigh in with a thought: I'm still preparing, but you reminded me of an academic friend who used the NaNoWriMo (Nation Novel Writing Month) system to write a student textbook. I've been considering using it as well when I start writing papers etc. as I'm used to it from the novelwriting I've done. It covers quite a few points of what you mention here: * daily goals: the big yearly one is 50k words in November, but there are camp-months and you can use the system all year round for yourself * Body doubling: you can do write ins (there many who use it for other things than novels), use "cabins" (private chat rooms with likeminded writers) or just know that all around the world people are using the system at the same time * It focusses on getting words on the paper, many users discourage editing in favour of this. It is a drafting, churning out words - and to me that means decluttering the mind and then pressing on in those moments where you'd normally stop to suddenly discover those little gems of ideas that open up new thought realms.
I actually used NaNo to write the first draft of a novel 2 years ago! I vlogged the process on the channel and it was super fun. I think it's a great idea to use the opportunity to write your dissertation, too, though!
Thanks for the wonderful video, Morgan! I really enjoyed your presentation, and I liked seeing how your obsidian system is contributing to your dissertation!
Oh yay, congrats!! What area of theatre are you most interested in? Is it more hands-on like an MFA or more theoretical/historical, like Theatre Studies?
@@reaganlxietheatre Love that! I haven't done any work as a dramaturg, but I'm sure I would love it. I taught it a bit in the first year theatre class I taught :) And circus has borrowed the term for contemporary artistic work, so I have friends that work as circus dramaturgs 😊
@@TheInternetFan Firstly, a PhDs is necessary to be a professor, so the academic sector (some also go into the education area of academia specifically, like an educational developer. By the end of my PhD, I'll definitely have all the qualifications for that) Secondly, there is of course the arts and culture sector. This might mean working as an artist (for instance, a dramaturg, as mentioned above) and many PhDs in theatre are actually full-time artists who have gone back to school to understand their craft more deeply. Also within arts and culture might be something like political positions or consulting for the government. Consulting within arts and culture (like if a movie needed an expert on juggling to legitimize their juggling scenes, or whatever). Also, consulting agencies in general like to hire PhDs of any field. We also have the skills to be a writer, project manager, and a wide range of other things that require the soft skills we've gathered during the PhD. In some cases the specific field of the PhD matters less than the work/thinking you've had to do. So those are just a couple things!
Nicely done - more for June... ... what happened for July? : ))))) As I am playing catch up. AND!!! more on say reading Kim Stanley Robinson too, please. A normal week for me, is; Mondays - I do the fluffing of last week's readings Lit. notes into Permanent notes - but still as "Atomic" (as per Sönke Ahrens's and James Clear's ideas), and just as importantly using them for building a reading or a go find list... i.e. your placeholders. These placeholders - if I can't link to existing notes, etc., then it is indicating gaps in area knowledge (maybe be needed maybe not.) or the boundaries of tight niches. And as the last 'block' of a couple of hours is always floating - then this can be used to fill "placeholder gaps" that maybe be needed for tomorrow's 'actual' writing. So some fluffing of new dipping reads, etc. Then; Tues/Weds/rolls into Thurs if I have enough 'organised' to allow or need writing spaces. Finally into; Fridays, read and highlight... ... all day, and some Thursdays too. Then; the weekend is non-work... then the daytime and nighttime brain then does its unconscious shuffle and makes Monday's 'massaging' of the Lit. note to Permanent note so much more 'profitable'... lightbulb moments over the weekend (or and any other time) - aren't work - so do get captured, via a note app on the phone - which surprisingly we seem to have to hand 24x7 without effort. But for writing sprints - like your 10k words - the whole week can drop into - a bit like King, IIRC, 2 or 3 morning blocks of 90 mins. to a couple of hours each, and just write. The Obsidian arrangement of folders, notes, and current content/note - is so useful... PNotes can be ticked off as used and linked into which content. And holding the permanent notes and 'fragments' in Obsidian is nice - plagiarism of oneself, is as you say, so useful. Useful in all of the above, in addition, to Obsidian are Research Rabbit and Zotero, for stuff before it becomes a Lit. note coupled with Evernote and Google Keep to ensure that Post-Its don't become an endangered species. Garage door open or closed... still on the closed side of that rabbit hole, for now, but open to sequential 'limited-publishing' for the larger pieces and of course re-writes of the smaller items, if they are found to be lacking, etc.
Thank you so much for your advice! i've really found this video helpful, in addition to all of the ones on the Zettlekasten method when used with Obsidian. As a new person to Obsidian, I'm curious as to how you write your drafts in the software. Maybe i'm over thinking it and youre just writing them in a note form, but if youre stuck for video ideas, one showing your process would be appreciated!
I actually will hopefully publish the video you're describing next month! But my own experience with it hasn't been great, so don't expect too much from the video :P
due to very unfortunate circumstances, I had a month to research and write a bachelor thesis of 50 pages in a research field that I had only one semester of experience in. It was a traumatic experience but I passed. This video seems like a more sensible approach than my “still working 20h a week (because bills have to be paid) and running (because you’re a competing athlete), 2-hours a day of sleep, no sleep for 1 week” pain cave lol
Woooooah, are you okay??? I mean, congratulations for passing!! But I hope you get a bit of a break now! Do you find that running so much helps or hinders your academic progress?
How do you communicate and share your work with your advisor when it’s not ready for them to proofread or edit -that last part you mentioned I have had the hardest time with and actually cried in front of my advisor once because he was upset I’m not sending him anything -I don’t know how to tell him it’s not ready for him to edit and I havnt edited yet
Great question. I might see if my supervisor will do a video with me to talk through this sort of thing. I have a couple thoughts. Firstly, any time you send any draft to your advisor, you can tell them the type of feedback you want. Every time I send writing to my advisor I give her the context. I say something like: "This is VERY messy, I'm just getting the ideas out - can you tell me which ideas I should focus on? Don't worry about line edits, I'll probably rewrite most of this." And that helps her know what support I need and what she should look for. It makes sure she doesn't waste her time with line edits when all I need is help with broad ideas, or whatever. Secondly, it depends on the advisor. I think my supervisor and I have similar writing processes anyway, so she gets it when I tell her what stage I'm at and what I need. But some supervisors might only want polished writing. Others might want to meet weekly and hear about everything. So, set some ground rules with your supervisor if you need them - it's never too late! And setting loose deadlines might help, too, so they (and you) know when to expect certain types of writing. Personally, I like sending things that aren't polished because what's the point of polishing something your supervisor tells you to scrap anyway? And there's no point in them editing something that they'll want you to change. So, I think it's all in the way you communicate. But sending rougher stuff earlier is generally a good idea, I think. As long as your supervisor is cool with it.
Well I have never cried at work/school or in front of my advisor until that day -but thank you for the kindness and empathy and sharing that I’m not alone in that … also for your thoughtful reply … it’s still unclear to me how to ask for help or what exactly he would help me with - it’s all very unclear and I just have in my head that I do as much as I can then send him it when I have a draft completed but it takes so much work to get to that point -im at the point where it’s so unclear how to ask for help support what that would look and sound like and im not aware of what ways I even need it -so I cried bc he wants me to send him something and wants to help me but im not a point where I have anything ready for review … what you said about not editing on a line by line level -that’s exactly what I needed to hear that’s what im imagining he’d be doing and that’s not where I am -all my sentances are incomplete and it’s just ideas and things started and not developed and I think the same thing you said I don’t want to waste time developing things that he may tell me to cut anyway -but I feel like it will be hard for him to see or know or understand where my heads at or what I’m doing Like when it’s messy and like in this state -I’m afraid of what his response will be like he’ll be like wtf is this or Or he may just say yea go with it just do it write everything but then that’s just soo much :/ and I need smaller chunks and goals to progress :(
This is totally random, but have you ever read Syllabus by Lynda Barry. I was reading it this week and it reminded me of you. Especially a bit about "noticing" that reminded me of your video about writing "in your own words."
Lol, I'm sort of just not right now :P I wish I had a better system for it - linked with zotero or something easily - but I'm still figuring that out. So, for now, it's chaos that I will organize later :P That said, I'm still citing everything, either by linking to my source note for that citation or just typing it in-text. But I have no way to automatically transfer that into a works cited page or anything yet. Also, because I'm still in the first draft phase, none of the citations are set in stone and might change anyway. When I do come up with a good system, I'll almost definitely make a video about it!
@@morganeua I usually make a project document in zettelkasten where I copy and paste my notes, like in your draft 0, but I also list the literature that the notes come form. That way when I'm finished with my blog post, I can go through it and create a link to each work that I mention ( since having a citations list rather than just links in a blog post is considered bad practice in blogging, and bad for SEO) But, i do like a tad bit more structure in my zettelkasten. I actually ran into a pot hole a while ago with my zettelkasten getting too crammed with bad quality literature notes. I didn't know i was supposed to make permanent notes. So i found a webisite that had all of luhmans notes and then i used google translate to read them. He had these numbered chains with a semi-outline for the first couple notes, where he listed sources and stuff. He aslo had his notes organized by departments, his first being "On The Role of The State In Society In General" (not a perfect qoute, it was something like that) So I copied that but tailored it to me. Organized my obsidian by: Lit notes, Perm Notes, Bibliography, and Indexes. I dont really have a problem with organization or finding my citations anymore. But thats tailored to me, and your doing a bigger project. It might help to now how one of your followers work though, so maybe this will still be somewhat helpful. (sorry for bad writing, im not spending much time on this comment at all lol).
I think we share a brain LOL! I have so much fear around writing that it's paralysing. I don't know where it comes from - probably fear of failure. I'm such a perfectionist too. I also have the fear that I don't know enough about what I'm writing. It's so frustrating. I just want to bang my head on a wall continuously.
YEP. TH-cam actually helped me get over that because I get to keep putting out content for the whole world to criticize and it's helped me get over that perfectionism and procrastination :P I was also always afraid to receive criticism from my supervisor which led to perfectionism. Because if it's not perfect then I could claim it wasn't done, and if it wasn't done I'd never have to submit it, and if I never submit it I can't get criticism. But now I just send what I have, even if it's bad, and that's what ends up making it better :) We are more than our writing! If it's not good, it doesn't mean that WE'RE not good!
same. it sad how much i love it, and yet how much my fear paralyses me:(
@@morganeua you just hit the nail on the head about -'perfectionism'
Same here. I have completed all my experiments and writing has paralysed me to the point I now have convinced myself I need to re-do my experiments to collect more data. But like she said. Just write. So I will do that.
omG YES. Exactly this. 😭
I have 2 months to write 50 pages, less than 15000words. I was considering deregistering... you just left me super motivated. I can do this!
Omg, you can totally do this! Oftentimes a time crunch is exactly what we need to be productive! And remember, the best paper is a FINISHED paper!
I passed! omg... thank you... I wanted to deregister so bad, and this video motivated me. I was doing my masters in Civil and environmental engineering. with 7 modules and research... I passed 6 and my research. not too bad while working full time. Just wanted to say thank you.
I have 2 weeks to do 60 pages lol
L have 15 days to write 809,000 words bro😢😢😢
@@annamonreal6005 809000 words 😳😳😳
I'm delighted to discover your channel! So many negative PhD channels. Yours is positive and helpful.
It's honestly easier to motivate myself to write if I'm thinking happy, motivated thoughts about it!
I find Sönke Ahrens' writing goal advice to be very encouraging. Instead of word count, he (or someone he quoted) suggested to have a goal of 3 permanent notes per day. This way the focus is on quality not quantity. But obviously you are in the next phase where you are using your existing notes.
🎯 Key Takeaways for quick navigation:
00:43 📝 *The writing technique of giving oneself prizes for reaching word goals, such as buying a skull shaver or barefoot running shoes, can be surprisingly effective in staying motivated during dissertation writing.*
01:28 📚 *The goal is to write 10,000 words in a week, requiring around 2,000 words per day. However, potential challenges include interruptions for additional research as ideas develop during the writing process.*
03:15 🖊️ *Writing in Obsidian, the speaker uses placeholders like "refer to x book" with a hashtag pencil emoji to remind themselves to revisit and expand on certain ideas during future writing sessions.*
04:10 🚫 *Overcoming barriers to writing includes dispelling the myths that one must know the entire dissertation topic beforehand, start writing from the beginning, or have read every relevant book before writing.*
06:12 🎤 *To facilitate writing, the speaker uses techniques like selecting a quote as a starting point, employing one-inch picture frames to narrow focus, and adopting a writing style that doesn't presume complete knowledge.*
08:46 📝 *Writing advice includes finishing writing when still in a flow to ease resumption, reading the previous day's work before starting, and creating a "zero draft" or raw version of the document before refining it.*
09:41 🗂️ *The concept of a "zero draft" involves getting all relevant thoughts, links, and potential sources onto the paper in any form, facilitating the subsequent creation of a polished first draft.*
11:33 🕒 *Starting writing early in the day is advised to leverage morning productivity. Establishing a writing habit, pairing it with another daily activity, and preparing materials in advance are additional recommendations to maintain consistency.*
15:57 📖 *Key advice includes writing truthfully and authentically, not succumbing to external pressures or voices, and continuing to read widely to enhance writing skills and find one's unique writerly voice.*
18:03 👥 *Utilizing the concept of "body doubling," working in the same space as someone else doing similar work, can enhance productivity and make the writing process more enjoyable.*
18:57 📚 *When facing challenges in writing, some find it helpful to study or work alongside productivity-focused TH-cam channels, like "merv," for motivation and focus.*
20:09 🤔 *To overcome writing blocks, remember your "why" - the personal motivation behind your work, like wanting to buy minimalist running shoes or create a compelling TH-cam video title.*
21:21 📝 *When struggling, consider reusing paragraphs from previous essays on similar topics, as a form of self-plagiarism can be acceptable when building on your own work.*
21:47 📖 *Look into other people's dissertations for inspiration on structure, formatting, and phrasing, especially when feeling stuck in the drafting phase.*
22:28 🖊️ *Take a break from digital writing and use pen and paper to jot down ideas, inspired by fiction writers who employ physical tools like sticky notes and colored pens for plotting.*
23:35 🌟 *Write about topics that genuinely excite you each day, as it helps maintain enthusiasm and may lead to more fluid and enjoyable writing.*
26:37 📅 *Plan PhD writing around other life commitments, as some individuals have found success by organizing their work around specific moments, such as when a baby is asleep.*
28:43 🌈 *Maintain other hobbies to balance PhD writing, preventing constant guilt and pressure, with physical activities like running recommended for keeping both body and mind active.*
30:06 📚 *Enhance writing skills by reading writing guides and advice books, such as Stephen King's "On Writing" or Joan Bolker's "Writing Your Dissertation in 15 Minutes a Day," for professional development in the field.*
Made with HARPA AI
I just submitted my year 2 report of my four-year phd programme. It was a massive learning curve, 20k words, and everything in this vlog resonates SO DANG MUCH. Super insightful, relatable, and entertaining.
Congrats!!
Your Obsidian note taking process has been super helpful for me and I realized that I was not taking notes efficiently. I would like to see a similar workflow of how you go from self-contained notes in Obsidian to academic writing. What kind of tools or tricks you use to structure your knowledge into a readable form.
If it's of any help -- Danny Hatcher published a video titled "How I make notes", he combines Zotero, Obsidian and...MS Word.
@@TheInternetFan th-cam.com/video/HxaGi9BG0zU/w-d-xo.html
th-cam.com/video/HxaGi9BG0zU/w-d-xo.html
Thanks! I'm in a PhD program, struggling with perfectionism, fear of failure, etc., etc. It helps to see how other people cope with it and the solutions they come up with to overcome it. Love and appreciate the channel!
Thanks so much for your comment and support!
thank you so much!!!! I am currently writing my masters thesis and your tips helped me a lot
Thank you so much for this engaging and informative video about PhD dissertation writing! I am about to reach my write-up stage of my PhD thesis and your tips are definitely helpful for me to get mentally prepared!
I just wanted to say I love your channel! It has a lot of genuinely helpful information on it, and it doesn't have the whole "toxic productivity" mindset I encounter in so many of these kinds of videos. I've started using Obsidian because of your video on that and I'm really loving it. Your vlogs are a lot of fun too. Thanks!
Yay, thanks for being here! I think the best way to be productive is to really enjoy what you're doing. Because then you don't even need to try to be productive. You WANT to do it, so you DO it! That's how my TH-cam channel keeps existing 😂 If I started doing it out of obligation or for someone else, I think I'd stop doing it.
Amazing advice, left me super motivated! I can do this!
so yesterday i watched this video after procrastinating and feeling overwhelmed just by STARTING to write my thesis: in my mind I had to have read every book, article, case study, pretty much everything lol
that "just write" hit super hard lol but after many days in which i felt stuck i managed to pull off some solid work. i came back here to say thanks. I've been following you for a while (i discovered obsidian thanks to you) and yesterday this video and your work was super helpful. hopefully today will be productive as well. really, thanks for everything, and btw i gotta say you were rockin that buzzcut!!! ✊
Congrats on the writing! It's amazing what we can get done when we just allow ourselves to do it!
This made me feel better. It's my first time writing anything over 4500 words and it is an unwieldy beast trying to pull everything together cohesively
I think I've never found a more helpful video on dissertation writing than this one. Thank you SO MUCH! I will try out the tips you gave myself as I'm struggling with getting words down on the page so often.
Oh, that's awesome, thanks for saying so! I guess I should re-watch this so I can remember what I was doing... :P Hopefully I can make another once I'm done my diss to say what actually ended up working the best long term!
So, I'm not a PhD student (at least, not yet. I am a undergraduate student) and I have no dissertation to write, but I am a huge nerd and I have my own academic blog. Of course not many people read what I write, its more of a self-fulfilling hobby, where I can craft my own research and delve into topics that interest me. It is also a source of accountability for me, I pay about 200$ a year for it.
Despite that, your videos have still been so helpful for me. Your video on obsidian helped me understand the zettelkasten method better, when I first read Sonke the Zettelkasten method seemed bad to me. Now its my only method of note taking, and its so efficient! This video on writing a dissertation faster, has given me so many idea for writing blogs faster and better. I am so glad you exist, there is no other youtuber like you!
Thank you! And I'd love to check out your blog if you're willing to share it :) That's how I feel about my TH-cam channel (and also nobody watched it for the first 1.5 years). Like, making this video really helped my own motivation to do the writing. And I hope to start a blog someday soon, too!
Omg - you just validated how I have been feeling with my writing process - thank you 🙏
TH-cam recomended me you channel and it was just what i needed to finish my final grad project, hopefully ill handle it better now since my schedules got messed up
I love how your 10,000 dissertation is apparently multi-platform as well ;) excellent work, thank you for posting this for us (though I am post-dissertations & a sci-fi novelist & museum painter). My life is just one big Anne Frank series of notes just call me professor notes.
This video is so helpful, thank you for sharing. Been going through a anti writing phase. I am now motivated to start writing.
Yay for writing! Yay for writing literally anything! A chapter, a sentence, a grocery list - whatever, as long as we're writing! :P
I’ve been trying to finish my final chapter for months! I have the notes, I know the structure but for some reason I cannot put it together into coherent thoughts 😂😂 I set a permanent deadline of the first week of the new year so I needed to get going. this video is sooo helpful!
Oooh, I hope you're on track to meet your goal!!
Shocking advice. I only watched forty-two seconds of your video, but I am shocked that from all the advice you've read that the number one piece of advice you gleaned was that you should write your thesis.
Kudos.
Super helpful! Gearing up to write my masters dissertation over the next two months (terrifyingly short time to write it!)
You can do it!! It's totally possible! And remember the best dissertation is a done dissertation. It doesn't have to be good, it just has to be accepted 👍 (Although it's nice when we're also proud of it!)
Your points about writing constraints is so true. This is so true and applies to things in life as well. Love the zero draft idea - I have used "Miro" as sort of a random brain dump which I then bring into a zero draft - total stream of consciousness where I even put in aspirational elements - in this place thunder happens and I sell some point/idea.
On Edit: Besides Obsidian - what is your workflow for writing? Editors, citational format tools, etc. Music (any playlists style as background, etc.)
I have a friend that also uses a miro-like software to create a network of various pieces of data and then basically just prints it all out linearly and rearranges things! So far, it goes like: 1. put everything into Obsidian as notes and organize those notes into maps of content. 2. Bring that all into Microsoft Word which is connected with Zotero and edit in there, with track changes on to get edits from my supervisor. But we'll see, I'm still in the early phases of writing :) And yes, I listen to music all the time while I work - changes depending on my mood! Always lyrical, though, I love lyrics
Great tips as I have been struggling a lot with writing my thesis
I don't have to do any academic writings anymore but this was very inspiring. I might read some of the books you recommended. Also I'm a fan of study with me vids, including Merve. They do help me get focused, too. And I have to tell you, I loved every outfit you wore✨
Hahaha, doing TH-cam and doing it in style 💁♀️ Thank you!
Thank you so much for this video! I've been working on my master's thesis for way too long (thanks to getting sick, but it's also 45k and that's quite daunting) and this video has really helped me to get out of my books and onto actually writing.
So glad i found your channel.
Thank you. I'll start tomorrow 😂
Thanks, I feel that many aspects are possible after watching your Video as I am abe to see you lead by example.
You have changed my life for the better.
Love and respect.
Wish you a lovely life ahead.
Fuckkk, I feel this so hard. Currently do a research project for my Master's.
Thank you girl!! Prizes are a great way to motivate me. I'm stuck and very scared of starting reading and writing my master thesis. At least 80 pages, I wanna cry.
That fear of starting is definitely one of the biggest hurdles to jump! Try to tell yourself you'll do it for just 5 minutes! Slowly build up the habit and you'll hopefully build up the confidence as you do! You can doooo it!! 🎉💪
@@morganeua ❤️ thank u. Ive just got back to the readings only 1 hour a day. I actually had started back in July 2022 but then got covid and afterwards I was sick for 6 months. Now I'm started to feel better but I feel so sad tthinking that I could've graduated by this time.
@@padmeasmr Oh no, I'm sorry to hear that! But you should be so proud of an hour a day, especially if it's academic reading. I honestly find it hard to do more than that in a day! I have to break up the reading with other tasks.
@@morganeua yeah me too cause you need so much focus! (I study philosophy and I'm reading in four languages lol). But I'm also taking notes that will make writing much easier even though it takes more time now. Usually I read for an hour and then switch to summarize the content, keywords and noting quotes. I'm slowly getting in the habit but I refuse to dedicate too much time to it. I remember writing my bachelor dissertation during the summer, every morning for a couple of hours and enjoy the rest of the day. It took me a couple of months to finish it without stress. I hope that works this time too 🤣😉 btw love your content and hairstyle hereee
Just found your channel and loove it !!!
I have no idea how to write a big piece of writing like 60,000 words. Yikes. But, I do know how to write smaller pieces and for me I divide and conquer. I like numbers... so, 1500 words divided by 3 sections divided by 2 subsections = 250 words per subsection, divided by 2 paragraphs per subsection = 125 words per paragraph. Oh yeah. Thats not scary and completely unsurmountable, except at midnight the night before it's due. My journey...
Yes, that's a great tactic! I know a lot of people work like that in the PhD, too. Like, they'll write a bunch of shorter articles to be published and then turn that into the dissertation. It's definitely easier to write 250 words than 60,000 words! :P
Great! On point.
A bit late to the game to respond, but I thought I'd weigh in with a thought: I'm still preparing, but you reminded me of an academic friend who used the NaNoWriMo (Nation Novel Writing Month) system to write a student textbook. I've been considering using it as well when I start writing papers etc. as I'm used to it from the novelwriting I've done. It covers quite a few points of what you mention here:
* daily goals: the big yearly one is 50k words in November, but there are camp-months and you can use the system all year round for yourself
* Body doubling: you can do write ins (there many who use it for other things than novels), use "cabins" (private chat rooms with likeminded writers) or just know that all around the world people are using the system at the same time
* It focusses on getting words on the paper, many users discourage editing in favour of this. It is a drafting, churning out words - and to me that means decluttering the mind and then pressing on in those moments where you'd normally stop to suddenly discover those little gems of ideas that open up new thought realms.
I actually used NaNo to write the first draft of a novel 2 years ago! I vlogged the process on the channel and it was super fun. I think it's a great idea to use the opportunity to write your dissertation, too, though!
Haven't yet dug down in your channel far enough to have seen it, but I'm not surprised you used the creative approach.
Bonus tip: Invest in a mechanical keyboard.
Have never turned in an assignment late since I started using them. They make typing so addictive.
Hahaha, I agree 😂 And in general, just invest in equipment that you like using and works for you! I love the tap-tap-tapping of my keyboard 😛
I agree! I bought two, one for at home and one for on the go. Makes the practice of writing feel good.
This is amazing thank you!!!!!
thanks for your explanation.
Thanks for the wonderful video, Morgan! I really enjoyed your presentation, and I liked seeing how your obsidian system is contributing to your dissertation!
And thanks for the wonderful comment, Christian! 😊
I'm entering a MA program in Theatre this fall & love your videos! Thank you for the awesome content!
Oh yay, congrats!! What area of theatre are you most interested in? Is it more hands-on like an MFA or more theoretical/historical, like Theatre Studies?
@@morganeua I am interested in dramaturgy! The program is based in history/theory, but definitely focuses on production and practice as well.
@@reaganlxietheatre Love that! I haven't done any work as a dramaturg, but I'm sure I would love it. I taught it a bit in the first year theatre class I taught :) And circus has borrowed the term for contemporary artistic work, so I have friends that work as circus dramaturgs 😊
forgive my impertinence, what sort of jobs does someone holding an MA or PhD in Theater do? In which sector is such a person employed?
@@TheInternetFan Firstly, a PhDs is necessary to be a professor, so the academic sector (some also go into the education area of academia specifically, like an educational developer. By the end of my PhD, I'll definitely have all the qualifications for that) Secondly, there is of course the arts and culture sector. This might mean working as an artist (for instance, a dramaturg, as mentioned above) and many PhDs in theatre are actually full-time artists who have gone back to school to understand their craft more deeply. Also within arts and culture might be something like political positions or consulting for the government. Consulting within arts and culture (like if a movie needed an expert on juggling to legitimize their juggling scenes, or whatever). Also, consulting agencies in general like to hire PhDs of any field. We also have the skills to be a writer, project manager, and a wide range of other things that require the soft skills we've gathered during the PhD. In some cases the specific field of the PhD matters less than the work/thinking you've had to do. So those are just a couple things!
OMG why can I relate to this soooooooo much! 😭 Such good advice! I am getting there girl.
Keep up the great wooork!
Great advice.
Good advice and great video editing! Love your content ❤️
Thanks! I hope my video editing improves a little bit in each video :)
thanks for your tips :)
Nicely done - more for June... ... what happened for July? : ))))) As I am playing catch up. AND!!! more on say reading Kim Stanley Robinson too, please.
A normal week for me, is; Mondays - I do the fluffing of last week's readings Lit. notes into Permanent notes - but still as "Atomic" (as per Sönke Ahrens's and James Clear's ideas), and just as importantly using them for building a reading or a go find list... i.e. your placeholders. These placeholders - if I can't link to existing notes, etc., then it is indicating gaps in area knowledge (maybe be needed maybe not.) or the boundaries of tight niches. And as the last 'block' of a couple of hours is always floating - then this can be used to fill "placeholder gaps" that maybe be needed for tomorrow's 'actual' writing. So some fluffing of new dipping reads, etc.
Then; Tues/Weds/rolls into Thurs if I have enough 'organised' to allow or need writing spaces.
Finally into; Fridays, read and highlight... ... all day, and some Thursdays too.
Then; the weekend is non-work... then the daytime and nighttime brain then does its unconscious shuffle and makes Monday's 'massaging' of the Lit. note to Permanent note so much more 'profitable'... lightbulb moments over the weekend (or and any other time) - aren't work - so do get captured, via a note app on the phone - which surprisingly we seem to have to hand 24x7 without effort.
But for writing sprints - like your 10k words - the whole week can drop into - a bit like King, IIRC, 2 or 3 morning blocks of 90 mins. to a couple of hours each, and just write. The Obsidian arrangement of folders, notes, and current content/note - is so useful... PNotes can be ticked off as used and linked into which content. And holding the permanent notes and 'fragments' in Obsidian is nice - plagiarism of oneself, is as you say, so useful.
Useful in all of the above, in addition, to Obsidian are Research Rabbit and Zotero, for stuff before it becomes a Lit. note coupled with Evernote and Google Keep to ensure that Post-Its don't become an endangered species. Garage door open or closed... still on the closed side of that rabbit hole, for now, but open to sequential 'limited-publishing' for the larger pieces and of course re-writes of the smaller items, if they are found to be lacking, etc.
rewarding myself with a gummy after every 1k words
Yessss! 🍭
Please please please… can you recommend books that show us how to write/ begin to write the dissertation? Thank you
Thank you so much for your advice! i've really found this video helpful, in addition to all of the ones on the Zettlekasten method when used with Obsidian.
As a new person to Obsidian, I'm curious as to how you write your drafts in the software. Maybe i'm over thinking it and youre just writing them in a note form, but if youre stuck for video ideas, one showing your process would be appreciated!
I actually will hopefully publish the video you're describing next month! But my own experience with it hasn't been great, so don't expect too much from the video :P
@@morganeua Thank you! I'm sure it will be useful if only by giving us a reason as to why it doesn't really work. Many thanks!
I need this!!!!
If obsidian is just a document of your notes then how do you convert these into long prose is very confusing? Thank you!
Needed this, thanks :]
due to very unfortunate circumstances, I had a month to research and write a bachelor thesis of 50 pages in a research field that I had only one semester of experience in.
It was a traumatic experience but I passed.
This video seems like a more sensible approach than my “still working 20h a week (because bills have to be paid) and running (because you’re a competing athlete), 2-hours a day of sleep, no sleep for 1 week” pain cave lol
Woooooah, are you okay??? I mean, congratulations for passing!! But I hope you get a bit of a break now! Do you find that running so much helps or hinders your academic progress?
At what point of point in the note taking should I consider to start the draft paper?
0:39 got me. LOL
😂
How do you communicate and share your work with your advisor when it’s not ready for them to proofread or edit -that last part you mentioned I have had the hardest time with and actually cried in front of my advisor once because he was upset I’m not sending him anything -I don’t know how to tell him it’s not ready for him to edit and I havnt edited yet
Great question. I might see if my supervisor will do a video with me to talk through this sort of thing. I have a couple thoughts.
Firstly, any time you send any draft to your advisor, you can tell them the type of feedback you want. Every time I send writing to my advisor I give her the context. I say something like: "This is VERY messy, I'm just getting the ideas out - can you tell me which ideas I should focus on? Don't worry about line edits, I'll probably rewrite most of this." And that helps her know what support I need and what she should look for. It makes sure she doesn't waste her time with line edits when all I need is help with broad ideas, or whatever.
Secondly, it depends on the advisor. I think my supervisor and I have similar writing processes anyway, so she gets it when I tell her what stage I'm at and what I need. But some supervisors might only want polished writing. Others might want to meet weekly and hear about everything. So, set some ground rules with your supervisor if you need them - it's never too late! And setting loose deadlines might help, too, so they (and you) know when to expect certain types of writing.
Personally, I like sending things that aren't polished because what's the point of polishing something your supervisor tells you to scrap anyway? And there's no point in them editing something that they'll want you to change. So, I think it's all in the way you communicate. But sending rougher stuff earlier is generally a good idea, I think. As long as your supervisor is cool with it.
(Also, don't worry about the crying in front of your supervisor. We've all done it. It's part of the process)
Well I have never cried at work/school or in front of my advisor until that day -but thank you for the kindness and empathy and sharing that I’m not alone in that … also for your thoughtful reply … it’s still unclear to me how to ask for help or what exactly he would help me with - it’s all very unclear and I just have in my head that I do as much as I can then send him it when I have a draft completed but it takes so much work to get to that point -im at the point where it’s so unclear how to ask for help support what that would look and sound like and im not aware of what ways I even need it -so I cried bc he wants me to send him something and wants to help me but im not a point where I have anything ready for review … what you said about not editing on a line by line level -that’s exactly what I needed to hear that’s what im imagining he’d be doing and that’s not where I am -all my sentances are incomplete and it’s just ideas and things started and not developed and I think the same thing you said I don’t want to waste time developing things that he may tell me to cut anyway -but I feel like it will be hard for him to see or know or understand where my heads at or what I’m doing
Like when it’s messy and like in this state -I’m afraid of what his response will be like he’ll be like wtf is this or
Or he may just say yea go with it just do it write everything but then that’s just soo much :/ and I need smaller chunks and goals to progress :(
What would you say to your supervisor during the video call?
Have you tried whisper ai on replicate for example?
Oh my.
I’ve got 3 days to write 12,000 words with a rough draft, fingers crossed I make it 🫡
Wooooah, best of luck! I believe in you! But also, that's a big goal, so forgive yourself if there are bumps along the way!
This is totally random, but have you ever read Syllabus by Lynda Barry. I was reading it this week and it reminded me of you. Especially a bit about "noticing" that reminded me of your video about writing "in your own words."
I haven't heard of it, but it looks amazing! Thank you for telling me about it!
Thank you😂🤣 🙏🙏🙏
Exactly that's what I wanted😚😚😚😚💋💋💋🤩🤩🤩🤩🤩🤩🤩🤩🤩🤩
Subscribed👌🏽
Writing in Obsidian how are you handling citations?
Lol, I'm sort of just not right now :P I wish I had a better system for it - linked with zotero or something easily - but I'm still figuring that out. So, for now, it's chaos that I will organize later :P That said, I'm still citing everything, either by linking to my source note for that citation or just typing it in-text. But I have no way to automatically transfer that into a works cited page or anything yet.
Also, because I'm still in the first draft phase, none of the citations are set in stone and might change anyway. When I do come up with a good system, I'll almost definitely make a video about it!
@@morganeua I usually make a project document in zettelkasten where I copy and paste my notes, like in your draft 0, but I also list the literature that the notes come form. That way when I'm finished with my blog post, I can go through it and create a link to each work that I mention ( since having a citations list rather than just links in a blog post is considered bad practice in blogging, and bad for SEO)
But, i do like a tad bit more structure in my zettelkasten. I actually ran into a pot hole a while ago with my zettelkasten getting too crammed with bad quality literature notes. I didn't know i was supposed to make permanent notes. So i found a webisite that had all of luhmans notes and then i used google translate to read them. He had these numbered chains with a semi-outline for the first couple notes, where he listed sources and stuff. He aslo had his notes organized by departments, his first being "On The Role of The State In Society In General" (not a perfect qoute, it was something like that) So I copied that but tailored it to me. Organized my obsidian by: Lit notes, Perm Notes, Bibliography, and Indexes.
I dont really have a problem with organization or finding my citations anymore. But thats tailored to me, and your doing a bigger project. It might help to now how one of your followers work though, so maybe this will still be somewhat helpful. (sorry for bad writing, im not spending much time on this comment at all lol).
18:12 it’s your mirror neurons at work
Many of us with neurodivergence can't just 'sit down and write', so I know what you mean.
Barrier No 3 - 😢
Fantastic video!
que vídeo precioso! ❤
❤❤
I can’t type that fast.
brilliant advice !!!
listened to the part about not writing until 3 p.m. at sharp 3 p.m. not having written at all.. 🥹
You've still got this!