I am a grad student and I find it?s more and more critical for me to
be more disciplined.

Here are some examples of my symptoms:
* I am addicted to the web. I estimate a 4-6 hours per day on useless web browsing.
* I don?t work till the last minute; and whenever life threatening job
is done, I no longer work even though I know there are a lot of long
term work is there awaiting.
* I wish to sleep early and get up early but ?I can?t?. I don?t go to
sleep unless I feel very guilty otherwise (that is 5 or 6 in the
morning), spending the time gaming, watching movie and web surfing.

I abridge my problem to be the lack of self-discipline:  I know what
is correct and what is wrong, but I have problem forcing myself to
give up ?what I want to do now? for ?what I want to have eventually?.

I read some books like ?The 7 habits of highly effective people?, ?the
feeling good handbook?, etc. But they are too thick and I can?t find
easy to follow recipes. Frankly, although I know finish them may be
good for me, I can?t finish them.

An ideal answer would include the following,
* A short summary on what the problem is, and the possible reasons for it.
* 5-10 instructions that I can follow immediately and see myself making progress.
* A list of classical books/treatment methods would be good. But at
the current stage, I may have problem following them.

Thanks a lot for the help.

---

Request for Question Clarification by missy-ga on 04 Jan 2005 19:37 PST

Hi David,

You sound like you're my long lost brother.  I used to be the same
way, but now I'm not.  In fact, I work successfully from home now,
which requires loads of self discipline.  Learning it isn't as tough
as you might think.

Looking into some available web resources has left me with the
impression that they're a load of unhelpful hooey.  If you're
amenable, I can answer this from a personal perspective for you.  I
can't guarantee that what worked for me will work for you, but I think
I'm doing OK managing my work, kids, cats, community work and husband.
 Care to experiment?

--Missy

---

Clarification of Question by david553-ga on 04 Jan 2005 22:21 PST

Dear Missy,

I would like to hear your answer from personal perspective or whatever
way you thought will help. That will be a good answer to part 2 of my
question.

With my concern in the next paragraph, I still need some information
for part 1 and 3 of my original question. i.e.,
1. What is my problem, and the possible reasons for that. 
3. What is the "classical solution"? 

Here is what I thought. I believe in order to solve the problem, the
key is on myself. I can't reply on a magic answer and expecting little
efforts from myself. I am ready to make efforts. One big reason I look
for help here, is that I want to make sure I am running in the right
direction. It will be really sad if after months of working, I finally
realize that there were some basic methods that I didn't know, or even
my problem was not what I thought.

D

---

Request for Question Clarification by missy-ga on 05 Jan 2005 04:50 PST

Hello David,

I'm going to respond in the comments below, so as not to clutter up
the question space up here.  In the meantime, if someone has all of
the answers you need, they'll be able to post them here.

--Missy

---

Clarification of Question by david553-ga on 05 Jan 2005 14:01 PST

Dear Missy,

Please correct me if I understand your clarification question in a wrong way. 

Please post your solutions as an answer. I don't want to take your
time and leave you unrewarded.

As for my questions, if you feel there is difficulty for any of them,
please just post whatever you have in hand(and your google keywords so
that I can continue). I tried hard to find the answers by myself, and
I understand the difficulties -- it's pretty complex and maybe not a
well defined question.

Thanks for the help.

D

you say you're a grad student; are you able to keep up with your studies?

(you did't specifically mention this, although I imagine this is why
you're asking the question)

are you actually failing your classes?  not coming through with grad work?

ts

Actually, I am fine with my courses, I can at least get a B with no
problem. The thing is I "have no time" to think about future: looking
for a job etc. If there is no exam, no project due, no immediate
deadline, I just go idle.

I just finished grad school, so I'll give you a few personal tips that
happen to work for me...

Make rules for yourself, but make them reasonable enough that you'll
follow them.  E.g., "Between 2 and 4 PM, I will not use the web, play
computer games, or watch TV.  Or "From the time I get up tomorrow
until I finish XXXX, I will not play any computer games."  It helps if
you tell your rules to somebody so that you have some accountability. 
(I often phrase mine as promises to God, so I am accountable to a
higher power.)

When you do something you're supposed to do, reward yourself. 
Chocolate is a good reward.  (Withholding lunch from yourself until
you have accomplished something can serve as a punishment while you're
slacking and reward once you get it done.)  If you haven't seen this
grad student comic strip-- http://www.phdcomics.com/ --you can read it
as a reward.  (It's really funny.)  But make sure you decide in
advance how much of a reward you get for a specific amount of work. 
Then be honest and don't over-reward yourself.

My system is based on the idea that I can establish better habits by
making minor rules to change my behavior and eventually expanding on
them to achieve the desired goals.  It's also based on
conditioning--rewards for good behavior and punishment for bad.

With regards your sleep schedule, don't worry about it.  Grad school
is a good time to have a weird schedule.  When you need to get up
early later on (for a job or whatever), you'll do it, but it's hard to
find the motivation if you don't need to.  But if you do want to
change your sleep habits, here are a couple tips.  If you allow
yourself to feel okay about just going to bed, rather than staying up
in the hopes that you might do some work later, you may find yourself
able to go to bed earlier.  Also, you could try signing up for a fun
morning class that would get you up at a decent time.  I took foreign
languages (my idea of fun classes), which generally meet in the
morning.

Finally, make sure to give yourself some fun time.  On Friday night,
don't do any work and don't feel guilty about it.  Get out and do
something fun with friends (not web surfing!).  Hopefully this will
help you decompress so that you'll be motivated later.  Leisure time
spent feeling guilty because you should be working isn't real leisure
time.

Dear biophysicist,

Thanks for the help. Congratulations to your recent graduation. 

Many of your tips are very useful. I also believe propose minor
changes first and actually achieve them could be the base of a good
habit system.

BTW, that PHD comic is really good. 

D

As long as you are getting everything in on time, and you are getting
an acceptable grade, then you have little to worry about.

- the survival mechanism is kicking in before disaster occurs.

You have another problem that is keeping your mind spinning, and you
use the Internet to divert you.

Bit of a problem, that, going out on a totty hunt could disrupt a
working 'equilibrium'.

Bromide is probably the simplest solution.

Okay, here is a reference that undercuts the situation and, with some
thoughtfulness, could lead to a solution.  I swore I would not
evaluate for you so I withhold further comment!!!!

http://www.actualtraining.net/

I have the exact same problem as yours. Not at school, but at work.
Since I'm the only employee my company has in my city and I
communicate with my boss only through e-mail and occasional phone
calls, he doesn't have an effective way to control what I do. I spend
most of my day browsing on the internet and I only do my stuff when I
can no longer keep lying about it to my boss.

I must tell you that this behaviour is new in me, because at previous
jobs I had I wasn't like this.

I got the realize that the reason why I'm really not doing my job is
because I really don't care about it. It is boring to tears and I have
to do things that I hate doing. I guess that is the source and origin
of my attitude.

You might wonder then, why do I keep this job instead of pursuing
other kind of career. Two simple answers: 1. I'm actually making good
money. 2. The city where I live has very high unemployment rates and
it would be extremely difficult to get a well paid job in my
professional field.

In the end, my advise for you is to think if you are really interested
in what you are studying or not. And if not, maybe it's time for you
to think about a change.

i am not sure this will help you... but here is my suggestion: 
"the way is unimpeded harmony".
i think that it is also the classical solution.