The Undistracted Fellow

Posted on by Dr Karen E McAulay

Logically, it should make no difference where we sit to work on our research. A laptop, a table and chair – that’s it, isn’t it?

However, my concentration is undeniably better in St Andrews, and I’m convinced it’s because of the circumstances.  For a start, it’s a seven hour round trip by bus. If I spend that much time just getting there, I’m certainly going to make the most of every hour whilst I’m there.

Secondly, I sit in quiet, comfortable surroundings with no distractions, whether it’s the office-with-a-view, or Martyrs’ Kirk reading room. That’s a privilege.

Time is neither carved up into obligatory breaks at specific times, nor do I need to stop one thing to do something else unrelated but unavoidable. Another luxury!

But most of all, there’s the feeling that being a guest fellow is an honour, so I want to squeeze as much as I can into the time available.

This week, I’ve written half of one of the two talks I’ve agreed to do, and spent a couple of hours at Martyrs’ Kirk. Sadly, one of the books I wanted to see, turned out not to be the sort of book I’d expected. Knowing the author’s prime focus, I thought that it would be a Victorian school book, but this one wasn’t. (At least I hadn’t bought it on eBay!) Maybe it means I’ll think of him as a more rounded individual, though, so perhaps it was worth having a look for that alone.

Hullah in staff notation mode!

But that’s another good thing about visiting St Andrews. It’s five minutes from my desk to a library. To look at the same thing in Glasgow would take up a whole chunk of a day, by the time I’d got from home to town. (And when I’m at my own library, I’m just a worker bee – neither a researcher, nor do we have the same resources.)

Mind you, having ruled out Hullah’s national songbook, there’s nothing for it – the next book on my list IS in Glasgow. You win some, lose some, I guess!

Featured image by Chen from Pixabay

Positivity

Posted on by Dr Karen E McAulay

Do you generally have a positive outlook on things? How do you bring yourself back to a state of equanimity if you catch yourself being negative?

‘Negative’, me?

Actually, I suspect that sometimes what other people construe as negative, I see as merely an abundance of caution. I know that my responses of, ‘But what if ….?’ tend to be met with a sigh and cries of, ‘Oh, don’t be so NEGATIVE!’ My tendency to circle round an issue, looking for inconsistencies or identifying what could go wrong, is so often interpreted as pouring cold water on things, whereas actually, I’m intending to be constructively helpful!

Self-Inflicted ‘Injury’

But I inflict these criticisms on myself as well – when I focus on what I have not done, or not been, rather than on what I have actually achieved.

Beware the Making of Comparisons

I have not been a full-time academic in the normal interpretation of things – I’ve been an academic librarian who did a mid-career PhD part-time, in her own time, at her own expense (and subsequently qualified with a PGCert teaching certificate). I’ve engaged in plenty of research activity since then, and I’ve been seconded as a 0.3 researcher for over a decade now. But I’m not a full-time academic, and it follows that my output of publications and presentations – impressive enough for a 0.3 scholar – will never equate to what I might have done if I had been a full-time one for my entire career. Often enough, I catch myself beating myself up about what I’m NOT.

Daft, really, considering I’m qualified as a librarian, a musicologist, AND have the teaching certificate. Which isn’t a bad profile to have.

The Solution

Now, I know that it’s a good idea to challenge negative thinking, if it’s bringing you down. However, I don’t keep a happiness diary or anything similar.

But for a number of years, I’ve devised a simple trick – I have an email folder in which I keep messages recognising contributions that other people acknowledge I’ve made. Vanity? Maybe, but at least when I’m on a downward spiral, there’s somewhere I can go to give myself a kick into a more positive attitude! I got the loveliest and most unexpected email yesterday, which completely transformed my evening. Into the folder it goes. Unsolicited appreciation is such a tonic!

I also make sure my list of publications (on another page of this blog), and my institutional repository are kept up-to-date. That way, any personal mutterings about ‘I haven’t done enough’ can be challenged straight away!

Just the way we are

However, I’d like to say to anyone not quite as far along in their career as I am (I haven’t scaled any lofty heights, but I am undeniably growing older!) – we do need to find a way of bolstering our self-belief. For some of us, it’s not easy to ‘look on the bright side’ all the time. Being brutally honest about oneself might seem like false modesty to the outsider, but from the inside, it feels like being realistic. My own upbringing has memories of being compared with others whenever a school report or exam result came out; and the importance of not being boastful or blowing one’s own trumpet. Indeed, the very letters after my name have been considered ostentatious – and that was recently!

In light of all that, I don’t think it’s remotely unreasonable to devise strategies for looking on the bright side when an attack of insecurity strikes!

What do you do?