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I think it's incredibly hard to give general advice about the Ph.D. process. Even within the same discipline, the work varies greatly from sub-discipline to sub-discipline, and from advisor to advisor.
This is the most important bit in my experience. I had a pretty successful PhD and I loved my time as a PhD student. I'd have days or even weeks when I just didn't feel particularly motivated, and when that happened, I didn't sit at my desk twiddling my thumbs, I took the day off. Maybe read some papers, but almost never forced myself to do hands-on work if I wasn't feeling it. Having an advisor that grants you this kind of flexibility, as well as the flexibility to let you take on projects that make you feel motivated, is pretty important for a successful and non-torturous PhD, IMHO.
(Meanwhile I know of other advisors whose students would come into the lab 7 days a week and try to sell their work-life balance by telling the story of this one time when one guy the afternoon off on a Friday to go skiing. It's bizarre to me that some advisors think that kind of whip-cracking is the right way to make creative endeavors successful.)
Fewer hours. And yeah, I agree -- that's how I got mine done.
There is just no way around grinding out the experiments. You literally have to will something to work in multi-month long pushes where you iterate again and again until you figure it out.
Deep work is good and nice for the theoretical parts, but all the academic superstars/upcomers I know work super long AND super hard to make conference deadlines all the time.
Of course, if you just want to graduate without stressing all that much or much ambition, this might work.
Just try this for a week... 1. Remove Facebook/Instagram/Twitter from your phone. Using parental controls disable Safari. Remove your email too if you can. 2. Use SelfControl to block these websites for 24 hours at a time. So you only get to check these things once every day. After you've checked it, quickly block again. If 24 is too much, start with 8 or so. But always block again right after checking! SelfControl:…
> Keep a journal of sticking with this habit. I always print current month, put it up in my kitchen and I cross off days. I'm currently doing that for my diet, but it works for any habit you wanna build. You mean like a calendar? The "string of unbroken crosses technique"? Or do you mean something else?
The point is that you should create a meta-habit of checking your habits. A daily reminder.
So, I inverted that and worked my ass off like I was still an undergrad in the first 18 months, toned it down for the next year and submitted my thesis at 2 years 10 months (the earliest my university would allow a submission) and was viva'd and passed 2 months later with minor corrections.
PhDs taking forever is generally a lack of initial work by the student rather than any external factors. Too many students let their supervisors fob them off rather than getting in their office when needed and forcing their projects forward.
Also, selecting a sensible area with a high likelihood of novelty helps, I worked on energy harvesting for hostile environments (high temp photovoltaics, piezo etc at 300degC) which was a new area for the group and my supervisor, and published 6 papers as basically nobody else was working in the field.
Doing a PhD in the UK helps, in and out before the funding dries up in 3-4 years is expected along with no class requirements and no masters needed (can go in straight from Bachelors).
Just try this for a week... 1. Remove Facebook/Instagram/Twitter from your phone. Using parental controls disable Safari. Remove your email too if you can. 2. Use SelfControl to block these websites for 24 hours at a time. So you only get to check these things once every day. After you've checked it, quickly block again. If 24 is too much, start with 8 or so. But always block again right after checking! SelfControl:…
The biggest thing I noticed when starting my PhD was all the first and second years derping around not doing much, all the third years panicking and "just getting going" and all the 4th and 5th years really grinding. So, I inverted that and worked my ass off like I was still an undergrad in the first 18 months, toned it down for the next year and submitted my thesis at 2 years 10 months (the earliest my university wo…
Fewer hours. And yeah, I agree -- that's how I got mine done.
I admit I logged in to HN to make the same grammar correction. Fewer/Less grammar errors bug me badly. I don't know why this particular grammatical error bugs me so, but every time I encounter it, I have an inner voice that yells 'fewer.' My family hates me for it.