A confession about working weekends

A thought provoking blog to add to our slow scholarship discussion.

The Research Whisperer

Image from Memegenerator: https://memegenerator.net/instance/40630318

I came back to academia after being in a professional role for over three years with a promise to myself: I will not work across weekends.

As I mentioned in a recent post, some people derided my promise. Many more laughed in disbelief, or were encouraging in their words but exuded an air of ‘that promise is doomed, doomed!’. Having been in a professional job where I found it extremely easy to maintain the boundaries between work and non-work time, I was very used to having weekends in my life. I assumed that transitioning (again) into an academic role while keeping weekends free would be relatively easy. It was the status quo for me at the time, after all.

Two and a half years after returning to academia, then, how is my promise of ‘not working on weekends’ going for me?

Terribly, I have to say.

And I acknowledge…

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Why slow?

This blog post on slow scholarship by Agnes Bosanquet is a must-read.

The Slow Academic

Last week I listened to Kate Harris, CEO of Good Environmental Choice Australia, present on courageous leadership to a group of early career academics. She shared this image (from startwithwhy) and asked people to think about why they do the work they do:

Kate made herself vulnerable and shared her purpose, motivation and inspiration. Her grandfather’s dying words to her were: Make peace in this world. And she dedicates her life to this goal. Her words inspired me to think about why I wanted to start this blog, and why I value slow academia.

Earlier in the day, I bumped into two colleagues – one whose partner recently died, and one who is in the early stages of cancer treatment. Both were at work, and working through shock and grief. Work can be distracting and colleagues can be nourishing… but something more important is going on for…

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Slow reading at a writing retreat

Here’s one scholar’s account of practicing slow scholarship – inspiring!

The Slow Academic

I spent the beginning of this week on a 24 hour retreat with my PhD student, colleague and friend Lilia Mantai. We left our children with their fathers (this deserves a special thanks from me as it coincided with our wedding anniversary) and went to Billabong Retreat. I adored every minute of it. Please note that this post is not sponsored in any way. We paid for the retreat with research funds that I won as a lucky door prize at an early career Christmas in July event. Yes, I am lucky and privileged.

We practised yoga and meditation. We ate beautiful food. We slept deeply. We read. And we wrote. We are co-authoring a paper on doctoral student and early career academic (ECA) experiences of time pressure. No doubt I will post on that in the future.

Here are some highlights from my contemplative reading on time…

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