Episode 120: Consistency With Dr. J

In this week's episode, I'm sharing one of our calls from inside the Finish your Dissertation program about consistency. 

TRANSCRIPT:

On the class I love when it tells you so people can't sneak up and try to record you by accident cause that's rude. So we're going to be hanging out tonight, touching base, seeing what's going on as always I'm Dr. Collier on faculty and residents for our program is good to meet new people and see familiar faces. We're going to start with this mantra that we always do, which is, you know, enough, you have enough and you are enough. In the past I've said he's a foam roller moments. If something feels off to you, sit with the Woodfield off and keep saying it till this, right. And so you figure out what it is that is like not clicking. And so I'll say it again, you know, enough, you have enough and you are enough. And we have one of our grads are Dr.

Jacey you're on the slide. She wouldn't did it. And so we're going to slide on the lounge. So tonight's overview is that we're going to just check in and we're going to do that for a while. Probably not even a whole hour. And then we're going to have some writing time and then we're going to come back and do some kind of some community and a little commentary. Just what did you get done? What was the helpful practice that you had while you were away? And they shared any last minute pieces and then some almost to say and keep writing. They can, I will not be here. I've been at work since 7:00 AM. So I'm going to go rest for the night at rest of my voice as usual. We're going to start with checking. YL let me go to spar.

Here we go. We're going to start with, check-ins we just name, location, how you doing with your scholar basis? What are you celebrating from this past weekend month? And so I can go first part of the huge I'm that did Joel call your she, her I'm in north Brunswick, New Jersey. I'm the director for institutional equity and strategic initiatives at Rutgers university. On a scale helped me, holy ghost. My energy is about a good eight cause I just went to the park. My focus, my piece of that is solid 10 and my scholar basics. I mean, I moved the whole, I did move for 10 minutes. I haven't had my 60 minutes by myself yet and my water's been pretty good, my journal and I do at night. And so I'm doing pretty good without that. From the past week or a month I'm celebrating some Tomball, my siblings, they live an hour away, but because of the pandemic, we haven't been able to see each other as much. And so I got to spend last weekend with them and learn how to make these little thingies that can hold my plants. I know that's so cool. So that's what I'm celebrating. Who else most to check in is not required, but it always appreciate it. I got you. I got debris that you can put it into the check or you can come off mute to share with the team.

Thank you, Scott. All right. Y'all just put a thumbs up, thumbs down. How y'all doing. Hey folks. Hey, sorry. I am on two screens tonight. Cause I'm doing my updates to my presentation. My name is Margaret Sebastian. I'm physically located in Salisbury, Maryland. My defense is on Monday and I'm going to Los Angeles this weekend. So I had a whole conversation about if I should go to Los Angeles the weekend before my defense. And I was told by my chair to go relax. That's right. That's right. That delay. I rented a whole loft in Atlanta the weekend before our defenses, we went to Atlanta, had a good time we'll being grown. And then we went shopping for outfits and pearls. And then we went back for our defenses and look at us, take care of yourself in the process like you need to, she's like, oh, I have a good time.

My energy is kinda low. My booboo left today. He's going to meet me in LA. So I'm probably like a five. My focus though, like I have been like staring at this computer for a while. So I'm like, I actually showed her my presentation and she gave me some feedback. So that's what I've been doing for maybe the last like hour, like playing around with that. My piece is like a tan. So she said I should go. I think that was, that was releasing because I don't think I should go and enjoy and enjoy your holiday. And she was like, no, go have a good time. So I am going to go and I'm going to see where my grandmother lived at before she passed away. And I'm going to go to the beach and yeah, I'm having a good time with my birthday.

My Scala basics have been really good. I have been really consistent about exercising every single day and having time to myself and journaling, not journal since he's been here. I think that's been real interesting to not journal and not to be reflective because he's always here. Doesn't go anywhere. So I'm celebrating that. My goals for June are slowly but surely being met. All my credit cards are under 30%. That was one of my goals. So it was like a goal that was, are being very intentional about that. And you know, honestly, I'm just celebrating that my committee is healthy. One of my committee members was in the hospital and I was a big mess and they're healthy enough to respond in email. And my chair has given me really good feedback. So that's where I'm at. I'm feeling good. Well, that is good news to hear. And I'm sending really good vibes your way. Save travels and sending up good vibes for Monday. What'd you say? Yes. Monday three 30 Eastern time. You want to come? You are more than welcome to you. Just say, send me your email and I'll add you to the list. Okay. I'm pretty sure I got an ugly grown up me and with somebody Dean somewhere. But if I don't, oh man, who wants to share next again? You can go into the chat or you can come off mute.

I'll go Tasha number two, I guess it's okay because we have another passionate group now. So I'm so social justice and energy. Definitely at like a four focus at like a two piece at like a four. I think these are the lowest, my things I've ever been in scholar basic stuff. Well, you had a good Sabbath. So I've been hanging on for my little 32 ounce smoothie king cup, because Fridays is bought, our Friday side has been refilling it. So with all the liquids. So I know that the drink four of those a day to reach half my body weight celebrate from the past weekend month, it's still June. I'm really, I'm spoken with all of my chairman, my committee members. So I spoke with my second chair, Dr. [inaudible] When I went to go drop off her gift and she was really sweet.

She asked me, how are you doing? You know, what do you need? And so it was just really good just to have a conversation, just a brief one, but just like, you know, that they still around, they still care. And she was just like, don't worry about it. Just keep riding it. And so, yeah. So while I'm feeling a little low energy, just because it's just the heat and exhaustion and I just kind of want to do this and I'm here. Yeah, so it's good. 60 minutes for myself. Yeah. I've been at the shops and I've been, the store is killing the water generally mentally move for 10 minutes. Yes. Complete top three. I still need to plan for this week, but I have an impromptu plan that I've been following. So I'm good. I'm just need to get out my the other three up. We had a death in the family this week. So, but you know, I've been here. So I told him I I'm going to start coming home for weeks because every time I come home, somebody passed away, but I just happened to be in town when it happens. So but everybody's the family. Like we all like everyone's at peace and everything. So I'm really happy about that. And we could the kids. Good siblings. Good. Everybody's is good. It's just me and this little keyboard.

So yeah. Sorry about that. Passing. the Tasha take care of yourself. Thank you. I don't want to be peer to peer pressure. So Dr. Morgan said she's doing well and that her son got promoted. We love to see it. All right. Okay. Gabby's nodding her head. Okay. Well let me slide on the loan. You already cause we going, all right. So we're right on along the thing for June is structured for success. Now y'all got an email or packet or something with all of these, get up early at it, got the Lacey sent out. So yes, this heat is disrespectful down there. I'm up here. But down there, my momma said it's high. Yeah, she said her walk. She had to cut it short. I say, girl, I don't got time for this. So y'all got all five of these in his diet connect.

Cause I went and red and was like, oh, this is delightful. This is amazing. So there's commitment, which talks about actually showing up the courage, which is like, yeah, sometimes the stuff is scary. It's not necessarily easy, but like, let me just come do this consistency, which is where we're going to kick it for the night was talking about like, yes, whoop whoop de doo doo doo. Yes. As mundane. And it builds your privacy, builds your habit. Care is like, listen this night for no pump. Like you actually gotta have some like hustle to get through this, right. Not in like a exhaustive way, but the process processes, whichever you're in can be exhausted. So you want to take care of yourself so that you don't burn out and like fizzle and frazzle and then there's celebration, which is like a spiritual discipline to me.

So we talked about it last month that you got to celebrate the stuff right in the moment. And as you go, you don't wait until the end. Right. You don't wait until you die to celebrate that you would live in. That will be ridiculous. So you do it every year for me every six months or just on a random Tuesday, but this particular session we're going to unpack consistency. Ooh. I have a saying, when I'm dating, I liked consistency. Something else, six feet and six figures. Hey man. And so do you see that first on my list? I'm not gonna bring my motto. So consistency is first because it's the basis for for like showing up and like, like being repetitious in the work. Right. And so we want to just kind of hang out there again, all of these pieces are part of an earlier document that you all received that strongly encourage you to go back and review it with it.

Because it's, it's actually pretty rich. It's all consistency is a quality of always behaving or performing in a similar way or always happening in a similar way. So it's again, just the repetition of doing it again and again, you consistently show up consistently have a good attitude. You consistently be right, right. You consistently speak up in meetings. You, you have a habit or pattern of doing it in a way that people can count on. Okay. and so we're going to hang out with this. I really appreciate consistency. I'm a Sagittarius. So sometimes I'd be wrong about something, right. I don't think we're consistent about everything. And there are some things with which we are consistent unconsciously. And then there are things that we actually have to take a focused, disciplined approach to our consistency, to build a habit. That's right. We all appreciate consistency in our relationships.

What I just told y'all consistency, insert fix me six figures. Okay. A customer service, right. I had to break up with Chick-fil-A because of their bad politics, but I, one thing I love about them did they consistently have good service. I put their politics aside. They consistently have good service. I know when I go to Popeye, it's going to be in and out. Might be a 10 minute, wait, it might be a 20 minute. Wait, might not be chicken. Might be chicken biscuits might be good. They probably not. I just know these things at restaurants, right? I don't go to places that consistently have bad service or the food is raggedy or it's questionable, unlike that they showed you got breakfast, it'd be blessed in my soul. Amen. So whatever it is that you want to name, we like consistency. And so at the end of the day, we hate being basic, but we our brains appreciate easy routines that can commit that that we can commit to every day.

Right. my, my therapist is good for saying if you show me what you're consistent with, I can show you where your habits are. And I'm like, Belinda, I didn't come for this today. I did not come for that. I gave you a co-pay, but I didn't come for that. And so greatness is built from taking consistent action. Does me showing up consistently in all the ways it takes to do the work, whatever you're defining your work as if it's building your business, if it's making milestones to your dissertation or your master's thesis or getting your some of the research done or being a thoughtful partner or being whatever it is that you're going to be, it requires you to do that sort of work. And so we're going to any feedback on that? Anything that's like, get it, got it. You can throw it over in the comments. You can come off mute.

Yep. Okay. We're rolling. Okay. Do you need help? I mean, it's a rhetorical question, but I think we all need help at some point in time. So it's great. Cause we're here to help you be consistent. All right. There are all kinds of ways that consistency is built into the group. Right. but in this particular case, it's just like talking about actually showing up and being a part of some stuff. So all calls are they help you consistently like on a frequent basis in a dependable way, check in with your mind to increase your results and productivity without burning yourself out. When we're consistent with something, sometimes we kind of go on cruise control with it. If it's something that's, that's easy for us and we can forget to take care of ourselves or we can forget to stop and actually check in with ourselves and say, how am I doing what's going on?

Like, how was this working? How am I doing particularly for a process like this, whatever that process is consistently making time to check in with yourself and in community with other people matters. I don't know how I would have finished my dissertation happy as well as his state of mind. Had I not made time for that in a consistent manner. If you have a car and not that our bodies are cars, right? But if you have a mode of transportation and you only get cared for it, sometimes in these really infrequent intervals, you're going to burn your car out a lot fast, or your tire's going to be raggedy. This is going to not be a good look. Your oil is going to be tow up inside your engine. Your engine is going to wear out. There's just a lot of stuff. You're going to have the windshield wipers that scrub the actual windshield. And it's going to make a lot of noise in the rain and we're going to laugh with you. So don't be that don't be the squeaky windshield wipers.

So when we're talking about strengthening your writing habits, well, okay, there we go. There are a couple of things to consider set a timer and brain down. If you're anything like me I get real high, then think I'm getting, write everything in five minutes and I can't, or I think I'm going to write for five minutes and then just go. And then I get like exhausted because I did too much at one time. So setting the timer for me for like 15, 20 minutes, just lets me get everything out without trying to revive. They'll just put it on their paper. Don't worry about grammar or punctuation. Don't be mean erase as a whole word, just to get one word back, just go ahead and write it out. You know what it's going to be when you read back through it, literally just get it out your brain.

Then once you get everything out of your brain, walk away from it for at least 24 hours. Dr. Lacy is really good at this. I'm still struggling with this. I'm going to have to write it, fix it at the same time, but I'm working on it. And then after break, come back, set a timer 10 minutes and then make your edits because remember writing and editing are two different things and revising is a different process than just writing. So try those things to work it out. Other pro tips that can help you strengthen your writing habit. Ooh. Sometimes people text me while I'm on here and I keep these previews and I'm like, Ooh, this messy. But y'all, ain't on that screen today so y'all can see it. Pro tip is try journaling every morning. This is actually a really helpful practice for me when I just need to set intentions for the day or clear my mind of things that came up during the night or that come out of dreams or anything like that. Yes, please, please, please put those into the comments. Use your phone or your notebook or jot down the first thing that comes to your mind without judging yourself.

For me, that's really hard. Even when I write in my journals, sometimes I have a hard time, not, not wanting what I write out to be perfect. And I have to be intentional with myself to say, just write it, just write it, write it is what it is. You can make sense of it later, but just write it, just get it out because if it's in there, it needs to get out. You can shape it and mold it later. Just get it out, making tea or my favorite one to drink in the morning. Absolutely. Yes. Get your system up and moving is a go-to and then this will help you develop a consistent writing habit. So will you just write in the morning, you get your body to move in, you get your brains and moving and then you can shape it up later.

Any other habits to strengthen your writing habits? I also Boyd record myself when I'm talking or thinking through something and listen back to that and right as I'm listening back to it sometimes I have conversations with other people that helped me to think something out that I need to write, but I've already written something and I give it to them to give me feedback on absolutely. Yes. Sending it to a friend and talking it out loud with someone who doesn't know your topic, because they'll be like, this is cute, but I don't understand this part. How did you get from here to here? I'm somebody who doesn't like me, but I appreciate what feedback does, but I always cry. Don't tell nobody. And so I just have to keep it to myself even when I'm like, I need to see that. And I'll be like, man, why didn't I think of that first?

And so that's me being like, thinking that should be perfect. That's a myth, right? Because perfection is a myth, it's a lie. And then it stops you from actually getting the support that you need. And if there are people who want to see you do, you can share your work with them. Right. And then they will give you feedback that strengthened your work. Right. I think sometimes we are short to share our work because we don't trust the people. Who's giving us the feedback. Right? So the thing about who's giving you the feedback. So there are two people on the phone earlier this week, not about writing, but about something else I've done. But I always ask for earlier this week, I asked some of my closest friends, this is why you don't do therapy eight o'clock on Monday. I text them. I'm a person of contradictions and I need to be clear on what my own contradictions are.

And I'm like, girl, you don't need to send this out. And then I press send. And what they send me was not news to me. Right. But it is something that I wanted to make sure I wasn't off kilter about and to understand how they understood who I was. And so our writing can be a lot of things for me, writing is personal is professional. It is a way that I represent my ideas. It is how people understand who you are. People make judgments about you based on your writing. And someone can feel very personal. I feel like Erica by doing so think about people who you can trust your writing with and your work with, and then share with some of those people. I'm a laboring on, but I just want us not to be afraid of writing. Absolutely. Yes, absolutely. Yes, absolutely. It's not the breeder. Anything else? Am I missing? Something was like, yeah, that sounds right. Like, nah, that's not it. Or there's some other practices that I have that might be helpful for other people.

Okay. Well, if y'all think about it, just slide on over there in the comments. All right. All right. So that's me. I'll be so thankful that Dr. Bruton pulled really good pictures. Cause they done took my, they dropped her website at work and they got me looking at shiny and glossy. Dusty. How long does the ad glossy and the picture? Oh, have mercy. So it's time to reflect. We know that when we do stuff we can learn, but if we don't reflect, we can actually lose the part of the learning in it thought we're usually not supposed to just stop here. But I actually want to just put on a song and let people do a little journaling. I keep asking people to talk out loud. I'm an extrovert. I can externally process, but that's not. If everybody else has some stuff, y'all don't know all these people, they all need to know your business, but you need to know your business.

So one will turn on a little song and I want you all to think about what's on here. So when you hear the word consistency, what feelings come up for you? Because our feelings can tell us things. My therapist says, feelings are a doorbell, right? They tell us that there's something there. Then we can explore those things, know things aren't right or wrong. They just are. We can learn from that. So what feelings come up when you hear the word consistency? What does consistency look like for you? Not what do you want it to look like? Not what do you think it is now? What is, what, what is it that you're consistent with and then what are you inconsistent about? I consistently spend money on chocolate. I know that it's going to happen. I consistently am going to call my daddy once a week.

It's going to happen. It consistent. I might not work out. I might not pay it on my money for a good bull. Might not. I might not get on a full week. What is one way that you consciously that you consistently show up for yourself in the dissertation process? So focusing specifically on your dissertation or a specific crux piece of writing, how do you show up for yourself? Just, just one way, just one way and whatever way that consistent is most accurate for you. What are three things you can do this week to stay consistent? All right. And then how can your community help you be consistent? You don't do this alone. You might be writing. You might be thinking what the process is for you to engage in with your community. So we're going to listen to this little good song and yeah. See me in my car. We're going to go back what y'all want to hear. We almost miss mama. Leah actually y'all mean the world to me. So we're going to listen to Tony Braxton. Hey man. When it's all go off, come back.

Okay. Tony just sang us down. All right. Let me go back to the questions you don't need more time. Y'all good. Okay. Thank you, Dr. Brita for throwing the questions over let's do a little sharing out loud or in the chat. Number one, when you hear the word consistency, what feelings come up for you? For me, fear comes up. It's like, what if I make consistent? And I fell a flop and I'm a failure and his bread and his raggedy. And then I'm like, girl would be ridiculous. Oh, you got a side? Also hear the word safety. Because consistent me that I can depend on it. And that for me feels safe and very comforting. So those are feelings that come up for me, other feelings that come up for people that they want to share, I can share for me, it feels like scary or regimented or boring.

And so as a steer away from it, cause I think getting the consistent having is boring and it's not going to be satisfying and yeah, so I try to stay away. Yeah. Tired, Gabby. Like I feel the same way. So I don't, I don't really like the word, but then I know structure is so good for my life that I force myself to do it, but I don't like it. I know that structure is so important to my lifestyle. I force myself to do it. Yeah. Yeah. I think I consistently be like that, John, that, you know what happened when y'all be on schedule and I'd be like, it's so raggedy what? It's so boring and I'm like, Joan, do you want to be bored in a whale or friend and chaotic and looking sideways. Okay. Okay. Okay. Definitely the grownup. Thank you for sharing that.

Dr. Breeden, what does consistency look like for you? None of my words have anything to do with the writing sleep, family time, listening to music, lipstick thinking chocolate. I think something was supposed to be about writing. Hey man, but I ain't get it, but that's consistency. That's what I know is consistent. So anything that's consistent for other people? What does it look like for you? I guess in, in my writing process, it looked like writing with friends. I was, I was consistent with that. I could ride along, but I had to write with people at point I was an extroverted being in community, even if we had on headphones was important. Anything anyone want to share? Commit commitment, care, accountability being present. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. Okay. What is one way that you consistently show up for yourself in the dissertation process? Ah, somebody else want to share the story anybody want to share or what actual from the cell phone? The front line.

Yes. Yes. All right. Well, I'll say this if is that people just keeping their ways to themselves. That's cool. Think about how, what you offer can shape, what you share might help somebody else. But if there's not something that you can think of, even one method of consistency for showing up for yourself, let's maybe think about ways that you can in one way, show up for yourself. It can be that you eat a breakfast every day or most days it could be that you move your body. I would say that your scholar basics are way to show up for yourself in the process drinking your water, moving your body, right for prolonged periods of time when we're dissertating. We forget to reach out to people who we love, who can pour into us and see us as more than a knowledge producer. We tend to not do those things are kind of closed in. So coming back out, that's meditating daily absolutely all those things count. What are three things you can do this week to stay consistent?

Man, I would take a melatonin every night at seven o'clock. I need to start at nine 30. The three things we can do to be consistent with ourselves this week, get a, when you wake up and not lay in bed, that's right. I don't get on the internet until I get to work. Stop overthinking about what needs to be done when you figure that out. Let me know. And just do it. Okay. Well then that's, that's, that's just kinda how that works. All right. Just do it, just do it. Thank you, Scala wisdom. All right. And then how can your community help you be consistent? How can folks help you come on? Remember who I am not waiver for my inner knowing and just do it. Okay.

How can your community help you be consistent? Anyways, we can think of or sharing or just noting for ourselves. But then we had, we had a few earlier. We can, we can share our we can create spaces, cross things out for me, it was sharing my fear of what might happen if I can't get something done and just having people be like, I mean, sure. So that could happen. It could also be that that's not the case and that you're actually well equipped to do what people do or that's legitimate fear and it's going to be hard, but you got this. Yup. Using community as a check in. Yup. And for accountability, come on. Calendar requests and read my work well. Okay. Well I think y'all know where we going next. [inaudible]

Now, listen. I'll never know how to do this. So let me see. I got to stop over here. Right? I got to stop. Oh, well how many yellows on you? I think I got a raggedy. What'd you call it? Shift control for yes. Yes. I understand that in theory, but see I'm on my iPad. And so I got that zoom bar at the top. You said you can do it now. Am I on the screen? Because that top bar is black and my blessing. Yeah. I see. Okay. Let me get real good tutes. Come alive together. Let me know when you're ready. If you're coming on. Come on here. Love it. Okay. Okay. Ready? 3, 3, 1, 1, 2, 3, 1, 3. Got it. You're the best doctor Brita and I could ever ask for. All right. Let me see Shalott on back over here. Get our zoom game together. Got it. All right. Share content out again. Start the broadcast.

Granata out. I can see my screen. Can you get back to what we supposed to be gone? Thank you. All right. It was pictured time. We're back. All right, Debbie, go. All right. So y'all know what time it is. We're going to go ticket in our rooms. You should be able to put yourself in a room. You're going to go there. Do your things. You see what the titles of the spaces are? Yes I can. But before you go, I was going to wait to do that. So I have to, but I can do it now. We got an announcement. Well, oh no. Okay. So on June 30th from seven to nine, I'm assuming Eastern. We had Eastern, central, Eastern, Eastern. Okay. Thank you. So on June 30th from seven to nine Eastern, we, if you're willing and able your video testimonials thinking about what was your experience like before joining Paul scholars?

Why did you decide to join qual scholars and what have you been able to accomplish since joining qual scholars? Your video got about three minutes. Don't go over three minutes, maybe 180 seconds, 180 seconds, three minutes. That's that's your time limit. Don't go. And so you have a little bit of time to just think about it, but on June 30th from seven to nine, we'd love to have those from you. And gosh, there's so much good information and just like, oh, I wonder what the responses are going to be, because how big is it to see kind of how people got here what's been helpful and what was it like pre qual scholars and like during fall scholars. So, oh, well I hope you all able to join on the 30th. That would be really dope. We good at debriefing? Can you open the breakout word? Yep. All right. Let me go nursing. Hold on. Let me come out of here. I think this is where I actually do have to go on my big computer se came on to do it. Oh, okay. Yeah. I'll stay here for a second and just forget which one were you going to be in? I got to go to my real computer and let y'all in over there. Why do I have this ample time and forget hang tight job comment. Oh, I know. Probably. Yeah. Great. Okay.