I’m Celebrating My Achievement as a Scholar

I just discovered that today is my Day 25 on the Seinfeld Chain and I had never even noticed it. I have now fallen into a habit of writing every day. This was an enormous struggle at first but now that I have vanquished my tendency to work in huge bursts followed by long periods of inactivity, it feels like the most natural thing in the world to work on research every day. Today is my Birthday, yet I will still be working on my research because I don’t see what sense it makes to deprive myself of writing on such a festive occasion.

I now know that, for me, it is impossible to write for more than 1,5 hours a day. Anything over that results in low-quality writing. The best writing always takes place between the 50th minute and the 80th. There is absolutely no need to write for more than 1,5 hours a day if you do it every day. It isn’t possible to do the full 1,5 hours every day, so sometimes it is anywhere between 30 minutes and an hour. Which is fine, too, as long as it happens every day. And the 30-90 minutes have to be pure writing (without counting the bathroom breaks, online searches, and consultations with the dictionary). The other aspects of research (reading, consulting secondary sources) have to be done separately.

It is extremely rewarding finally to be able to organize my writing in a productive way. I considered joining a writing group but I honestly don’t feel I need to be stimulated to write. I do it as a matter of course nowadays. It took me about two years of an intense struggle with bad habits to get to this point.