Alison Elliott is School of Art PhD student at Aberystwyth University.
Years ago, a colleague said to me: “You don’t get stressed, you get excited.” In my comfort zone, hard work, and significant challenges that I can meet readily don’t faze me at all. A PhD is not like that. It is a completely new experience. It is a purposeful quest into the unknown, into a personally pioneering intellectually stretching exercise. It hurts.
Self-doubt partnered with self-sabotage are my enemies. Home-working, too far from the University for an easy commute, can be isolating. Ironically, the pandemic helped – a mutually supportive study group emerged. Meeting every fortnight on-line, we discuss a paper, and update each other on our progress. Cosy camaraderie has a down-side – in the form of waves of guilt if I don’t log-on. With a small holding to run, I speculate on the domestic pressures we all face, mine no greater than those that others endure. But throw in a sudden request to teach a module with no previous resources to lean on, and ambitious plans to write like the wind drift awry with ease.
Last year, I faced the ultimate de-stabilising event – a change of supervisor. I had been warned by other researchers about how devastating an experience that might be. Try as I might, I stopped in my tracks. Despite the superlative efforts of my second supervisor, I felt lost and abandoned.
Ian Archer’s ‘Stress and the Personality’ sessions here at Aberystwyth helped me through. I can now recognise the signs of stress creeping up on me, to understand personal stress triggers, and countering strategies. A regular writing habit has settled me. In the short-term the quality of writing is irrelevant; I just do it. That said, it is not so easy to avoid roadblocks along the way. I have learnt to find forgiveness within me and go for a run in the rain.