Hybrid Pedagogy’s Jesse Stommel and our very own Charlotte Frost rethink academic life and writing productivity in this on-going series of hints, tips and hacks.
EAT GOOD FOOD. Don’t eat junk food, especially when writing. Well, at least don’t eat junk food all the time. If you’re working to a deadline then it’s a good idea not to over-think these things and just grab what’s easy and handy and get the work done. However, where possible, it’s a better idea to get into a habit of eating (and writing) healthily. Aside from the fact that if you eat junk and sit at your desk all day all those sugars and fats will make you fat and unhealthy (and the last thing you need is to struggle with health issues on top of having to cope with the usual level of work an academic lifestyle involves) it might also make you a bad writer. Junk food will likely give you bursts of unsustainable energy, meaning you write in fits and starts and easily lose the thread of the argument. Too much sugar also makes you crash pretty badly, meaning your productivity will sink to a soul-crushing low and you might resort to too much caffeine, creating a perpetual cycle of peaks and troughs. Pay attention to what works for you. As a general rule, too much carbohydrate at lunch can make you sleepy in the afternoon. Instead try vegetables and protein at lunch time and save the carbs for dinner. You might also find that eating little and often keeps you charged up and that lots of green tea rather than one giant coffee keeps you energized in a more balanced way. And if you get coffee jitters, make sure you eat something while you drink your coffee.
