7 Productivity Tips – Tested and Approved*

*by me

After some long hours and lots and lots (and lots) of typing and editing I finally feel that I’m getting somewhere with The Eternal Dissertation. And I am thanking my lucky stars that it’s a subject which I still find interesting! After these few weeks I feel I have some tips on staying productive:

The tips:

• Don’t let you computer catch on fire. Although I would have preferred it if Binky (my poor laptop) didn’t catch on fire on its own account. Very rude.
• A few supportive friends and a great sister (or sibling) who won’t mind you rambling off on a tangent about how much work you need to do on X or Y for a few minutes. Even if they have no idea what you’re talking about. 
• Get your cat to help (or get a cat). Sir T is only too happy to remind me to take breaks by going to sleep on top of my books or in my chair as soon as I get up to make some tea.
• Tea and/or coffee. But don’t overdo the caffeine (rooibos tea is a great option) or the sugar. And remember the biscuits – only to be used as reward, of course *cough cough*. I have yet to meet someone who likes chewing on carrot sticks the whole time they are studying. And a carrot is just not as good a reward as a biscuit – admit it.
• Notebooks! Pens! Sticky notes! While apps are great, I still find pen and paper the best way to get my thoughts ordered.
• Music. Whatever you like, whatever keeps your mind ticking or your fingers typing. My choices usually change during the day. On the days I get up at 4am it’s usually something like Meat Loaf (But not loud enough to wake my neighbours. Because even really nice people don’t want to be woken at 4am by Bat Out Of Hell. You do not want neighbours fervently wishing a lightning bolt would smite you.). During the day some Early Music, a few playlists with my favourite songs or soundtracks and in the evening something like The Parlotones, Theuns Jordaan or Josh Groban.
• Save. Save. Save your work! There’s nothing like losing a file (or losing something because your computer caught on fire) to make you lose all your motivation (Thank goodness this didn’t happen to me. I only lost a few sentences.)

And now it’s back to work for me. 

Image of hand by GraphicsFairy.com 

I Have Actually Been Productive

Or, Why I have been MIA for 3 weeks

The short answer is working and studying. Luckily my tooth has been fixed (and I got an appointment with my own dentist and not the one I visited on The Saturday of Pain). I hold that my dentist is The Greatest Dentist in the World. He can do a root canal painlessly and you can immediately go back to work because you’re not writhing in pain.

At work we’re on double deadlines; so everyone in the company is on an adrenaline-filled rush to get everything finished before Christmas. My own adrenaline rush includes finishing my dissertation. This is the last push to submitting it in February next year; so I’ve placed all hobbies* on the back burner for now. This means almost no creative writing, crocheting, etc. But I don’t think I’ve ever been so excited about upcoming study leave!

I am still of the opinion that watching the new Thor movie will count as “part of my studies” (as it contains elements of Norse mythology**). Now I must just find the time…

Poster from Comingsoon.net

* Not including reading…

** My research is about the use of Norse mythology in Afrikaans and Dutch texts. 

I Disappeared! Well, sort of, anyway…

Book Wheel, 1588

I have not fallen off the face of the earth, travelled back in time or were asked by a certain wizard if I wanted to share in an adventure.*

Nope, I have been on study leave and then did some more studying. And I have come to the conclusion that it may be more difficult to shave 2 000 words from the part of the dissertation I’m currently working on than it is to kill off one of my darlings.**

* The last is especially unfortunate.

** Yes, fictional darlings. Do not phone the police.

It’s also been a bit of a yucky time personally, but, rather than bore you with details, I thought I’d rather post an awesome video to watch. Enjoy!

Typing Away and Tumbling Around

In a Labyrinth of Books

When studying, I inevitably carry more and more books over to the table/couch where I’m sitting. (“I’m sure I read something about this somewhere…” Proceeds to walk to bookshelves and pick up any and all books which may contain that “something”. Make a new pile and go through them. Start typing away again and forget about unused pile of books until about five cups of tea later when I realise there’s no space left to put the cup down.) I like to think of this as organised chaos; which will be cleared away as soon as I’ve had a cup of coffee. My cat (the very cute Sir T featured in various Tweets) likes to think of the piles of books and papers as his own playground; helping me to type deep insights like ;;;;;;;;;;;;;kkkkkkkkkkkkdhyaaaaaaaaaaaaa while walking across the laptop.

From Pinterest

At the moment I am busy with rewriting and editing a piece of about 11 000 words and trying to shorten it a bit as well while I’m at it. As I last worked on it some months ago, I can really look at the piece with new eyes. This sometimes also involves some face-palming – most recently when I found that the translation of the text I was quoting was, in fact, not translated correctly. But hey, taking almost 45 minutes to do your own translation and rewriting nearly 1 000 words is not that bad. Not. At. All. (This is usually my cue to make tea/coffee and listen to something like Linkin Park and not The King’s Singers.) 

In Other Writing News

Got some feedback on a story I submitted a while ago – I just need to do a bit of rewriting of a scene or two and then I’ll resubmit. I also submitted another flash piece and am really holding thumbs for that one as well.

Tumbling around

My page onTumblr – Coffee Stains and Brainwaves – is starting to look a bit more like a page, with quite an eclectic mixture of content. After a comment left on my other (Kammastories) blog, I was wondering whether I should make a separate Afrikaans Tumblr page or just keep everything on Coffee Stains. My main reason for making a separate page is that it would enable me to place content in Afrikaans, English, and Dutch and that most of the readers would be able to understand all three. I don’t want to alienate my “English readers” by having a mixture of content of which they can’t understand half. (This is also quite a dilemma on Twitter – do I translate everything? Do I leave some stuff only in one language, especially when I switch between languages during one conversation?)

After some deliberating, I decided on rather making one, integrated, page. I’ve also changed the name of the blog – from “Coffee Stains and Brainwaves” to “My Pen in My Hand”. I decided on this name because it means exactly the same thing in both English and Afrikaans (how cool is that), and should leave me free to share a wide variety of content. 

Inspiration Friday – Worth a Thousand Words

I don’t often watch music videos, but sometimes there is one which you at first just happen to see and then want to watch again just because it is so good. (It’s even better when you also really like the song.) I usually love Parlotones videos, but this one – “Stars Fall Down” – has especially been on my mind lately.

You can also read my post on "How to study in the real world" and Finish Year 2012 by clicking here.