When I was sitting in V499 at the beginning of the semester I thought everyone had their thesis figured out and I was just faking it. I thought I was far behind but at the same time, it still felt like a problem I could put off until the assignments were due. I didn’t want anyone to know that I didn’t know what I was doing because I felt embarrassed and ashamed that I wasn’t further along. Trust me, if you feel this way, you’re not alone. These are the top three things I wish I had known going into the semester and what helped me throughout.
1. Set Up a Weekly Meeting With Your Advisor
If you haven’t done this already do it now…seriously do it right now. Stop reading this and email your advisor your availability. This is the number one thing that helped me get through writing my thesis. As a functioning procrastinator, it is very easy for me to put things off until the last minute, but meeting with my advisor forced me to make notable progress every week. Additionally, if you don’t already know your advisor well this is a great way to get familiar with them and feel comfortable asking for help. Your advisor is your biggest supporter and they are there to help you with this process.
2. Speak Up
This is one piece of advice I did not follow myself and I later realized I could have made my life much easier if I had. I was initially too scared and embarrassed to admit that when it came to certain parts of data management I had no clue what I was doing. I thought that I would eventually figure it out for myself. I did not. When I asked for help it was not as big of a deal as I thought and I could work with graduate students to get my data together. I guarantee the more you communicate your struggles and concerns with your advisor and professor the less stress you will have. The earlier you do this the better. Being a top student can make it difficult to admit when you need help but writing your thesis is one of the hardest things you’ve had to do academically. It’s okay to not know what you’re doing.
3. Change Your Mindset
If you’re like me I avoided thinking about the thesis until I was forced to. It wasn’t something I wanted to do but something I had to do. Start thinking about your thesis as separate from your other homework. Although changing your mindset can be really difficult to do, making this change made working on my thesis significantly more enjoyable. I started to get excited about working on my thesis at the end of the day and it was like a reward after my other work was done. Once I was excited and invested in my thesis it felt more like a hobby that I was doing because I wanted to not just because I had to.
You can do this. Just keep taking it one step at a time. Good Luck!
Kendyl Smith is a Senior at Indiana University studying Public Affairs at the O’Neill School of Public and Environmental Affairs. Kendyl is majoring in environmental management with minors in political science and nonprofit management. Next year, she hopes to gain experience at an environmental nonprofit before continuing her education to obtain her law degree with a focus on environmental law.
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