Day 22: I dread everything these days

After a fantastic day of fieldwork yesterday, today I wake up with a sense of absolute dread and sheer terror. How the hell am I supposed to get through this in one piece? I have three weeks to turn something resembling a finished product to DA, and I'm nowhere near that point. And, my discipline is lacking. I can't focus to write. I want to do all the small things, and that's it.

I have such a difficult time sticking to a disciplined routine, no matter what I try to do! Ugh. So very frustrating. I feel like I want to cry.

But, despite all that, I recognize that all I have to do is START! I have an entire chain of things to start a trigger in my brain that it's time to work, but I don't do any of them! And I keep putting them off and putting them off, until I just can't do it anymore, and I wake up with this sense of... well... dread.

I feel like I'm being punished. Or punishing myself in the process. I just can't stand sitting here for too long working. My back hurts. My brain hurts. My heart hurts. I feel like I'm going to have a heart attack at any moment.

Of course, I'm being overly melodramatic, but still! This sucks!

I'm also feeling so incredibly lonely. I need human contact!!

What's funny about this... not funny "ha ha", of course, is that all my barriers are pschological. I haven't once said "I don't know what to about this one piece of data that's really annoying me". Actually, I feel that, very well, but still, that's not really the reason why I'm feeling overwhelmed.

I'm feeling overwhelmed because I have a mountain of data, and I haven't even begun to make sense of it! I don't even know how to start to make sense out of it!

What I need to do is.....

Sit down. Shut up. And get to work. Stop mourning, work! Stop complaining. Work!

Damn. This is really much harder than I expected. And, in the back of my mind, I'm thinking that school starts in eleven days! Eleven days for me to get ready for three different courses! What the hell???

Starting tomorrow, I'm going to start working on my syllabi for a couple of hours each morning, so that way I don't get too overwhelmed by what I need to do.

This will get done. This will get done. This will get done, damn it!

ARGH!

Day 20: I'm tired... So very very tired

I can't for the live of me get motivated to get work done this morning... well, today. I woke up around 6:00, had coffee, and then it was time to fight with grading. A very simple process ended up taking me over three hours. That's because I agonized over the grading. Two students failed the class. Well, one of them failed, and the other one got a D. I don't know what happened with her. She kind of tried, but not enough to pass the class, especially when she didn't show up to class. I'll just wait and hear about the fallout later, I guess.

I'm so distracted... and tired. Just very very tired.

This last interview is really wigging me out, and I just don't want to work on it. Part of it is because it's so big. The other part is because it's officially my last interview that I have done, and then i delve into my fieldnotes. I think there's a lot more meat in there, but I'm disappointed that my interviews didn't do what I wanted them to. It's a bit hypocritical to be teaching a course in methods, while my methodology was so poor. Live and learn, I guess. It's a process, and I need to just get through it.

After grading, I just couldn't do it. Could not concentrate for the life of me. I just want to get up and move and do other stuff. Pretty much anything but sit here. I hate it when I get like this. I really need to be very efficient with my head-clearing routine, every single morning. It helps put me in the mood, which is what I need to be. It include coffee, music, timers, etc. etc. All of that is part of my daily routine.

But, another part of it is that I haven't been using my planning binder. That's bad. I need to see the things that I'm doing, and cross them off, and interact tangibly with them, and keep track of the big picture. This is really the only way I can get through this process.

And, of course, I keep feeling like the phony police is after me, watching me. Who am I to be doing any of this? I absolutely have no business in doing anything remotely related to this.

And, lastly, I spent part of the morning trying to contact my university to see what the minimum number of credits I can register for without dropping below part-time. I can't even find out how they define part-time, and if I do drop below that, then the loan repayment kicks in, and I'll have to start paying that back. I just can't deal with any of that right now.

And, of course, the beginning of the semester is looming in the horizong. The syllabi are not finished. Heck, I haven't even started working on them yet, and I know soon enough the students will be after me trying to get a copy. Sucks.

And on, and on, and on....

And, honestly, after a while, all of this starts to feel like excuses that will not get me anywhere. In the end, everything that I'm doing to put off working on this interview is just procrastination. I'm overwhelmed, and the sooner I recognize it, the sooner I'll be able to deal with it.

I don't think I need to be writing in here every morning for a half an hour. I think that's too much. Maybe fifteen minutes will work better for me.

Either way, I gotta get back to it.

First, however, I AM going to clean my bedroom because it looks like a pigsty, and it's annoying me. Then, coffee, then work.

yeah.

Day 18: I feel like I should be farther than what I am today

I'm sitting here, daunted by the task at hand. This is a major undertaking, and I'm feeling very overwhelmed by it. It's an exercise in discipline, there's no doubt about that. The discipline is not only about writing; but it's about the mental stamina it's taking to keep going despite all the doubts, fears, and anxieties I keep feeling. It's going despite feeling like my dissertation is utter crap. I'm a terrible researcher, and a worse interviewer. And, I have no discipline, and you can't really do this without the discipline. I feel absolutely awful about how I've gone through the dissertation. I worked so hard, yet, I feel like I have very little to show for it.

I keep emphasizing here that it's my "feelings", and not the reality. I have no idea what the reality is right now. Maybe, it's because I have no way of comparing what I'm going through with what other people have gone through. In other words, here are my questions:

1. Is it normal to feel like I have no idea what the hell I'm doing? Like the whole process is winging it?
2. Is it normal to have shitty data, yet come out with a brilliant piece of work?
3. Is it normal to feel so utterly lost in all of this?

I think the fact that I haven't read enough complete ethnographies is really hurting me right now. Anthropologists do not general share what they're going through in the field. They keep their journals separate from their data. But, the journals are as part of the knowledge producing process as anything else. It's really weird. I'm realizing that anthropologists are... well, I don't know what they are. I think it's a really weird position to be in. I make my career on the fact that I can observe people and write about them. My role, I guess, is to describe and explain patterns of behavior. Fine. If my role is to describe the logic behind behavior, then how do I know whether what I'm describing is real or not? How do I know that what I'm saying, is in fact, the way it is?

I guess I have a lot of doubts about the discipline itself, and my role in it. I guess I'm a little uncomfortable in that role. And, I'm worried this will show up in my writing and my analysis. If I am making descriptions of cultural logic....

I really never considered this fully before. This is a very strange situation to be in. But, am I, at this point, just ruminating because I don't feel like doing what I need to be doing? Or, is there something else? Is my discomfort about the discipline itself, or about the process of writing itself? How do I make sense of all of this? How do other people deal with this challenge? Is what I have enough? I guess no one can really answer this question for me, except for myself. There is no standard by which to do this research, or by putting the entire work together. There is no measure by which to say "Yes. I have enough, now I will write it all up". Nothing. In scientific experiments, the scientist devises the protocol, generates hypotheses based on established knowledge, executes the experiments, analyzes the data, and then accepts or rejects the hypotheses. And the process repeats itself.

But, in anthropology, it's very different. There are many ways of doing the research itself. There's the "here's a pen and pencil, see you in one year" approach. There's the descriptive research of a group of people, by describing their ways of life, their social structures, etc. There's the explanation of specific types of behavior. There's the applied, etc. etc.

The problem I'm having is what is my research? This happened to me once before in my MA, and until I figured out what the hell my "theory" was, I was just stuck. And now, I'm in the same situation.

What I have is this:
- Extended fieldwork with community A
- Some interviews from community A, but also some interviews with community B

So, is my dissertation about communities A and B? or is it about community A only? or is it about community AB?

That's the key question. I think, for my sanity, it's about community A only, with B as a comparison. So, what I can do is to find studies about the grouping of communities A and B, and demonstrate that they have very different realities. They have different histories, experiences, and realities. And so, my goal is to try to tease that out in writing. Group A is unlike anything else that's out there, and that's why I need to demonstrate. I can also discuss the fact that current programs that are supposed to address the needs of community AB are really ignoring the basic differences between communities A and B, which makes it so that community A is eternally isolated and insulated from other communities in the AB continuum. Also, that any reporting on community A is really in the context of its presence in Community AB, which masks the findings.

I think this is a valid approach. Why not? While I don't see too many similarities, I see some differences between the two, mainly the fact that these people from community A, have lost all their traditions and customs, and religion is one thing that maintains some semblances of cultural continuity. That's a really huge finding. But how does that explain the key variable that I'm studying? I don't think it does.... And if it doesn't, then I need to explain why it doesn't?

So, if I went in the diss with one idea and came out with another, that's ok! I just have to be very clear about why that happened. I guess I would advise my students the same way. There is no wrong way or right way to do a dissertation. But, I have to be very clear about what I'm doing, and why I did what I did. If I didn't do what I wanted to do, then I need to say that. Otherwise, that's where the problem gets in the way.

So, just keep talking it through, that's really important.

Also, now that I have all the interviews transcribed, I need to figure outwhat my central argument is. It could be as simple as Community A is this, and they have that, and they do this. Community B doesn't, without going too much in detail as to community B. Or, alternatively, it could be a cautionary tale of how not to do research in Community A. That's ok too. I just have to be very clear as to what I'm doing and what I did. That's the only thing that's going to save me in my defense. Again, this is not a perfect production, and I don't expect it to be one. But, it needs to show my contribution to the field, even if there's only one nugget to my findings. It is not something that I"m producing only for my committee. It's a stepping stone for me professionally, but it's also good for other people who might want to undertake similar research in this same community.

Day 16: Slowly but surely...

Braved the snow and went to a very nice lunch. Then I played in the snow for a while, then now I'm back to get some work done. Just taking a quick break to update this journal, since I didn't do it yesterday.

I have been working my ass off, and getting a lot of work done. Well, a lot of organizational work done, anyhow. But it's making me feel tons better, and a lot more confident about finishing up my dissertation. It's actually making it a lot more real than before.

Yesterday I downloaded all the templates that I needed for the manuscript preparation, and I put everything that I had until now in the template. What happened is that I had to add a chapter, and now I'm up to 104 pages of draft. It's definitely a SFD, but it's done! So, now I'm trying to identify all the stuff that I still have to do.

I really have to give myself credit for being so aware of how I do things. Since I started my studies, I decided on what I wanted to do, and almost all the papers I did for courses related to that. So that now come time to compose the dissertation, I can just plug stuff in where they belong, and be assured that I did all the necessary background reading that I needed to do. Anything new can just be plugged in where it needs to go. But, it's important to have the structure in before I do anything else.

Last night I also stayed up until after midnight working on my personal website, and I actually now have it to where I like it, so that I could start adding stuff to it without constantly be worried about how it looks. I am about 90% satisfied with it. It's professional, clean, and straight to the point.

And now I'm going to through the dissertation, moving things around, and adding random things here and there just to have a bulk. Because it's so huge, I need to have a way for me to get the view of the big forest before I start planting more individual trees.

And, after all is said and done, I have to pat myself on the back a little bit for being at this point. I could be fighting and whining, but no, I actually had the foresight to design my entre career in a way to lead up to this point. So that I don't have to worry about writing things from absolute scratch. Very few people do that, and I need to give myself a bit of credit. This is easy, doable, and it will be done. I just have to repeat that to myself, and not think about what I don't have control over, like my committee's reaction.

I'm going to hand in a draft to my DA, and then she can slash and burn as she wants. In the meantime, I can only control what I do, and that's about it.

Right. Time to keep going!

Day 15: Things I have to realize...

The fears will never change or go away. What will change, however, is what I do with these fears. It is my choice whether I want to let the fears direct my every move, or not. For now, until I get better at it, I am listening to what they are, acknowledging them, and then putting them gently to the side. I really don't have time to dwell on them for too long. What's ahead of me is far more brighter than what these fears are leading me to believe. There are opportunities... exciting, exhilarating opportunities! And... all I gotta do, is reach for them.

In the meantime, do my part, so the rest of the people in my environment can do theirs. I can't even begin to guess what their responses will be.. I haven't even turned anything in yet! I haven't heard a peep out of them yet! So... I'll just do my part, so they can do theirs.

Yesterday, after I had my little rant on here, trying to figure out what's going on, I did realize that this personal accountability is a fundamental stumbling block for me. That too is coupled with the desire to "please" people.

Classic example....

I was looking over the IRB that I did at the hospital, because I wanted to incorporate parts of it into my dissertation. After I read it, I was taken aback, because it just did not sound like anything I would say. It was brilliant, articulate, analytical, and just... well... perfect! I thought that the person with whom I collaborated had changed it, so I actually went out of my way to see where she made the changes. She didn't. It was all me. I actually wrote those brilliant paragraphs. And boy were they good!

Looking back on why the quality is so good, I realized that at the time I was writing the proposal, I did not want to seem like a "wishy-washy" social scientist. I wanted to write authoritatively, confidently, and like I know exactly what the hell I'm talking about. And, I did! It's a challenge, I think. I approached it from a "screw you! I can do this!", and it worked. But, I think it was also more than the "screw you" part. I wanted to present myself as a medical anthropologist; as someone who can speak to medicine. My writing, in essence, validated me and my discipline, and made me seem worthy to get in there, and do my work.

So, maybe I'm approaching my dissertation in a completely wrong way. I'm going into it with the "this is going to be a shitty product, but I don't care", attitude. I don't think that really works for me. I need to go in there with the "I know what the hell I'm talking about, and you're going to listen to me, and be convinced that I know what the hell I'm talking about". This is not a joke. I did good work.. in fact, some of the first of its kind. And, I have a lot of excellent ideas and insights. And, I do make contributions to the field, even if they are very minor at this point. But, give me two years, and see what I do with it.

Screw this. I'm not a student anymore. Well... on paper I'm a student, but if the IRB is any indication, then I am a professional, and I will approach this dissertation professionally.

And, if nothing else, I will be able to use parts of it as a grant proposal! Which is what I intend to do with it anyhow.

Yeah! I kick butt and I take names, baby!



Now... For today's schedule...

I'm debating whether I want to go out and gather some data for the quantitative part, or I want to try to put the structure of the entire dissertation together based on what I've already written in other places, and based on the outline that I have. Then, when I start analyzing the data, I'll know exactly where to plug them. That way, I can probably knock off at least two, potentially, three chapter drafts. Even if they're short. That's ok. As long as I have the structure from which to work.

Yeah... Maybe I'll do that.



So, tomatoes for today: 6x25

1x25 - This journal entry

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