Beeminding your way through grad school - actual hours of actual research!

[oulfis]

@lanthala

One of my beeminder goals was to do 20 hours of actual research work a week; weeks when I found it hard to hit that goal were often weeks where I didn’t know what to do, which was a giant flashing neon sign that I needed to go back to the drawing board and figure out what made the most sense to do next. Filling up your time with teaching or classes or other make-work is a way to feel like you’re moving forward even when you’re not, which I guess is another vote in favor of keeping careful data; I know my neurotic time-tracking habit has helped me identify “false progress” multiple times.

(This is off topic, but as a grad student I would love to know how you set up / tracked / enforced your “actual hours of actual research” goal, so I can blatantly copy it!)