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Jo VanEvery

You are here: Home / Archives for Writing

Developing a Practice

Image of person at a desk writingYour academic life is more than a string of articles published, classes taught, and meetings attended. You write because this is how you articulate and develop your ideas. You publish to communicate those ideas to others. Posts in this category help you develop the practices you need to do the work you love well without burning out or compromising your values.

You Need a Writing Practice is a good place to start to investigate the Writing subcategory.

Juggling 101: Elements of a good plan is a good place to start investigating the Planning subcategory.

Expectations

Posted on December 16, 2013 by Jo VanEvery 1 Comment

As an academic you are expected to do a lot of things, expectations that appear increasingly unreasonable. You may need to do more work than you think is reasonable but you do not need to collude in the erasure of the political agency of others. What happens if you stop using the passive voice when talking about those expectations?

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Boundaries, balance and the whole you

Posted on December 12, 2013 by Jo VanEvery Leave a Comment

Jo VanEvery, Academic Career Guide · Boundaries, Balance, and the Whole You The term “work-life balance” is out of favour. I’m not sure why. Perhaps because everyone is working so hard it seems like an impossible dream. I came across a recent piece in Harvard Business Review arguing for the importance of boundaries. They are not […]

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Beware the long list and wide expanse of time…

Posted on December 9, 2013 by Jo VanEvery Leave a Comment

As tough as this semester has been and as happy as you are for it to end, the transition from a heavily scheduled term to an unscheduled break is tough. You’ve probably got a long list of things too do. Too long, I suspect. A long list + an open stretch of time = procrastination […]

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A person with red nails and grey jumper holding a brown paper wrapped present with shiny red rippon tied in the traditional cross and bow way with a sticker ribbon rose stuck on top. Subtle meaning of rediscovering the joy in your research over Christmas break as you do when receiving and gifting presents.

You can ignore the grading.

Posted on December 5, 2013 by Jo VanEvery Leave a Comment

Jo VanEvery, Academic Career Guide · You can ignore the grading This post refers to the break between the first and second semesters of an academic year, which in the Northern Hemisphere tends to incorporate the Christmas holidays. Often the exams and assignments that come in at the end of the semester need to be […]

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Making progress on projects

Posted on October 28, 2013 by Jo VanEvery 1 Comment

There are two basic ways to approach a writing project. You figure out what the final product will look like and make a plan to achieve it. You start writing. I am reminded of a passage in Alice in Wonderland: “Cheshire Puss,’ she began, rather timidly, […] ‘Would you tell me, please, which way I […]

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2 people sit at a table facing each other chatting by a window

Writing for the people who will like your work

Posted on October 21, 2013 by Jo VanEvery Leave a Comment

It strikes me that many academics spend a lot of time and energy worrying about the people who will hate their work. Even before you’ve written the article, you are imagining someone criticizing it, probably in a particularly mean and hurtful way. No wonder you have trouble writing. Write for the people who are eager […]

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Writing makes you feel better

Posted on October 14, 2013 by Jo VanEvery 2 Comments

Think of a time when you weren’t finding time to write. How did that feel? I’ve heard enough academics complain about how little time they have for writing during term time to know that whatever specific feelings that brought up for you, they weren’t good. Now, think about a time when you were writing regularly. […]

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Is your mind always racing?

Posted on October 10, 2013 by Jo VanEvery Leave a Comment

I heard an interesting interview on my local CBC Saturday morning show* recently. The interviewee was a news anchor who had decided not to be plugged in and available 24/7,  but rather to limit his smart phone and other device use to 16/6. Yes, he decided to not be connected to the internet, phone and […]

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Writing is the social currency of academic life

Posted on October 7, 2013 by Jo VanEvery 1 Comment

In high school things like fashionable clothes, knowing the latest hit from a popular band, and being good at sports were the keys to popularity. Getting good grades might have endeared you to teachers and parents but it wasn’t really the currency of peer approval. The world you are in now is like an upside […]

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A photo of a printed calendar on white background with red plastic pins in some of the weeks and a red marker pen circle on the last day of the month.

Are deadlines helping or hurting?

Posted on September 19, 2013 by Jo VanEvery Leave a Comment

“I love deadlines. I love the whooshing noise they make as they go by.” ― Douglas Adams, The Salmon of Doubt In a coaching session, a client mentioned how she’d missed a bunch of deadlines for a co-authored paper and needed to set new ones. I sensed that the whooshing noise was not comforting for her so […]

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An experiment: Standing desk

Posted on September 11, 2013 by Jo VanEvery Leave a Comment

When I moved back upstairs at the end of the summer, I decided to experiment with a standing desk.

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Why finding time for writing is hard

Posted on September 2, 2013 by Jo VanEvery Leave a Comment

Recognize this little fella? Research day? Is that what you call it? You’re just staying home in your pyjamas taking a day off. You’ve got more important things to do like plan classes, and prepare for that committee meeting, meet with students … I certainly do. In fact, back when I was still an academic […]

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