Prep Procrastination

Procrastination is a permanent hot topic in PhD circles. If you suffer with it, it might not go away when you submit. You can still procrastinate about prep, about thinking about the viva, about jobs and everything else that comes next. Of course, just because you’re not actively working on something, it doesn’t mean that you’re not turning it over in the back of your mind. But you may feel bad for putting it off, and feeling bad tends to not feel so good!

Maybe a solution doesn’t have to be hard though. Pick a simple task for prep. Put it in your diary. Remove your distractions. And then get it done when the time comes.

30 minutes at this time, on this day, to do this task.

Phone on silent, email off. Start small, but start. Get something done.

Then something else, and something else, and so on. Prep doesn’t have to be three great big, long tasks. It could be lots of smaller activities with breaks in-between. You’ve figured out how to do a PhD despite procrastination woes! You can prepare for your viva.