Hard Limits
There are limits for everything related to your PhD journey.
There is a finite number of hours you could have spent on your PhD.
You can’t read everything that could be relevant. You would never have time to work towards your research in a practical way.
You can’t do everything that might advance your research goals. You would never have time to write up your thesis.
You have to make choices. You have to accept the limits, like them or not. You have to work within them, whether you want to or not. And, of course, the last eighteen months will have brought more limits.
Rather than rail against the limits and the maybes and the could-have-dones, reflect on how the limits of your PhD have had an impact. Explore the difficult limitations as you might have to talk about them in the viva. Remember that despite the limits – or in some cases, because of the limits – you have made it through.
Viva Survivors Summer Sabbatical: I’m taking July, August and September off from new writing to concentrate on other creative projects, so will be sharing a post from the archives every day throughout those months. Today’s post was originally published on September 20th 2021.