My first semester as PhD student has officially come to a close. The last ten days have been one for the books. When I left my house earlier today, I realized it was the first time I had been outside since Monday. It took a long time for my eyes to adjust to a light source that wasn't from Christmas trees or computer screens.
But now that I have survived, I thought I would pass along my top seven tips for surviving your first semester as PhD student.
1) Get yourself one of these things
Because if you're going to have read approximately a billion pages a week, you should at least be able be comfortable and preferably up to your neck in bubbles.
2) Hot Tea
More accurately, this is one of my tips for surviving life in general, because tea might be one of the best things God created on this earth. Bonus points if you drink tea while taking a bubble bath while reading a biblical scholar who's been dead for a least a century.
This is also one of the most true things I've ever read.
2b) Find someone who can make you tea
Because frankly, when you're surrounded by books and trying to churn out 3000 more words before bed, you're not going to have time (or skill required to dig yourself out those books) to make some yourself. Thankfully, Guy makes the best tea in the world (I married up, you guys.)
3) Sara Stephens (Pushcart nominated poet)
I feel like this one goes with out saying. It's for a million reasons, but also because she copy-edited my papers like a champion. (and seriously. they were really long and scary). Also, because sometimes she volunteers with my youth when I need extra help and once she dressed up like flower and only teased me a little when I dressed up like a pig and had pies thrown at my face.
4) Make your bed.
I don't know why this one works, but it does. I've made my bed every day since we moved into our new house (except for this week, when I turned it into my office after I get tired of the futon).
5) Be grateful for your cohort. Because they are brilliant. Because they are making you into a better student.
Because they sum what you're feeling with insightful sayings like this: "When full days of studying Greek are the light at the end of the tunnel, you know your finals week is a crazy time."
And because they remind you that you are not alone and that they are at least a few other crazy people out there who decided spending five more years in school was a good life decision.
6) Get a fire pit.
And use it. Invite your best friends over (one at time, of course, because you only have three chairs) and make s'mores and drink tea. Sit with your husband by it and discuss the pros and cons of a constructivism or about that show with the banana stand.
7) Be kind to yourself
During our first official advising session, the brilliant New Testament scholar, Luke Timothy Johnson, looked at us and said: "be kind to yourselves."
Now, he might have been only referring to what ancient texts we picked for our translation exam, but this became my unofficial slogan for the semester
Because there was always more reading that could be done. Always more translating that needed attention. Always more planning to do for church.
Always more of something.
But this semester, I tried to give myself a break every now and then. I took weekends off on occasion. Sometimes, I just went to bed with more pages to read. I tried not to compare myself with others, tried not to beat myself over the things I hadn't done or things I didn't know. I tried to give myself a little bit of grace.
It worked most of the time and it helped take some of the pressure off,
And when I was being kind to myself, it reminded me that I really love what I do.
One down, friends, nine more to go.
