PhD blog 19

Scheduling conflicts

A few weeks ago I was asked to read at a live literature night in Manchester. It happened last night, and had a curious effect on my PhD. I also write fiction (I did an MA in Creative Writing), and I decided to use the week preceding the reading to get some of my fiction into shape. ‘It’s fine,’ I thought. ‘I’ll do PhD work in the afternoon and writing in the morning.’ Well, it didn’t quite work out that way. I used the whole week up and didn’t do a spot of PhD work. I came to realise it is next to impossible for me to do both things at the same time, each discipline firing up a different set of neurons.

With last week’s experience, it feels pertinent to write about how a PhD overtakes your life. Don’t worry, I won’t be writing a ‘woe is me’ sympathy-fisher, but simply detailing what the average week is like for me.

Monday – Friday:

I get up at 8am throughout the week. Many people (my father, for example) would snort and say, ‘you could get more work done if you got up earlier’. For me this is not the case. If I’m tired, I mope around feeling sorry for myself and struggling to concentrate on anything more demanding than The Hits channel on Freeview. I start work at 9am, and usually read, make notes and such until around 1pm when I eat lunch. So far so boring. In the afternoon I do more research until 6pm, when I will break and watch The Simpsons – absolutely vital for my frame of mind. OK, so this is really dull. A not-very-exciting routine that is probably similar to everybody’s.

But factor in the days when I have to go to university, the days when I have to go into an office to do more freelance work, the days when I have to work at an off licence, the days when I have to work on the magazine that I edit, the days when I have to work on articles for various magazines, the days when I have to write this blog, the days I have to go to the library… it keeps going, but all these things seem to be pushed to the margins of my day by the PhD. I think about it all the time. I’m thinking about it now. Specifically I’m thinking about Marshall McLuhan’s theories of the phonetic alphabet and the global village. It’s not that I feel I have to do the PhD work all the time, it’s that I want to. When I finish this, I’ll jump right in.

Saturday – Sunday:

I get up at 8am and work. The routine is the same and I need to stop. I need to reclaim some time for myself. It’s dangerous to be such a workaholic I think. I sit at my computer both Saturday and Sunday, I still read all the books, I still research. I would advise against this hapless approach. I am now starting to feel the burn, so to speak. I only realised this last Saturday, when I went to watch The Dark Knight in the middle of the day (very good, by the way). I sat in the cinema, and didn’t think about the PhD once, and it felt good. I felt energised. So now, I have decided not to do any PhD work at the weekends. I’m going to buy a bike and get some exercise. I’m going to see my friends more. I’m going to try and reclaim parts of my life. I think it’s important so I don’t start resenting my studies.

Of course, I know other people doing PhDs and they have different stories. One of the people in the research office works on his theory and several novels at the same time. He manages. His fiction is even being published soon. Other people I’ve known are uncomfortable with how much of your life the PhD absorbs. As with everything else, balance is the key.

(I apologise for the tediousness of this week’s post, but as it turns out a PhD student’s life is very boring. I yearn for a car chase. I want to foil a bank raid. I desire the thrill of riding a motorbike without a helmet. Alas, my research does not bring me closer to these goals … I really should avoid Batman films…)

Graham's previous posts

To read more of Graham's experience of further study and the highs and lows that accompany it, go to Graham's previous PhD blogs.

Suggestions to editorial@prospects.ac.uk