Success in Graduate Programs: Tips and Tricks
The key turns. Slowly, the ignition cranks. It putters a bit. The key turns again. Puttering… again. A few seconds later, and for a third time, the key turns, and the engine roars.
Success in graduate programs is the car that needs a little love. As a veteran (and successful graduate) of four different graduate programs, I have seen in-person, hybrid, online, and COVID-affected graduate programs.
With your graduate program, you must keep your engine fueled, listen to the signals, and treat yourself with respect when your engine won’t turn over.
Make Time for Your Hobbies
First and foremost, the car needs fuel. Your mind and your body need fuel as well. That fuel must come from outside of graduate reading.
You must stimulate your mind throughout the graduate process. Take up crossword puzzles, sudoku, a new streaming show, pickleball, or like me, increase that movie-watching frequency. Warning: I have an app that tracks this. Throughout my graduate programs, which spanned six years, I averaged around 60 movies per year seen in theaters. While it seems like a lot, it was a release for two hours. For me, there is nothing like watching a flick on the 40-foot x 70-foot screen. While I often sat in the top corner of the theater alone, it gave my mind a focus that wasn’t on my studies.
Going to the movies afforded me the opportunity to not think about school, work, or home, and that is exactly what a successful graduate school student needs — a distraction and a release. Whatever your hobby is, don’t lose it.
Take Care of Yourself
With your mind, you must also keep your body fueled. Don’t rely on Thin Mints and Monsters. You’re not 21 anymore. You can’t go on a three-day bender and expect to recover for the life of a graduate student. Hit the brakes and fuel your body right. Eat meals as scheduled as possible and as well-rounded as possible. You will need mental focus and energy to be successful, and you can’t run your vehicle on sludge. Put the proper gasoline in the engine to make it purr.
Rely on Your Support System
If that engine isn’t purring, listen to the signals. If the check engine light is on, talk to a professor, a mentor, a doctor, the old lady on the corner with lots of cats, or whomever. Just talk to someone. It is okay to vent. That is listening to your body. Part of venting, though, is letting go. Once you get it out of your system. Let it ride. Think of it like an oil change. You are going to go to some random person, and they’re going to change you out.
They’ll show you the stick they dipped in the oil, and you’ll have no idea what it means when they show you. You’ll nod with utter and undeserved confidence, and you’ll drive away. That is totally normal and okay. When you vent and someone gives you advice, if you have no clue how to take it in the moment, just go with it. It will help your engine run and function. You just must listen to that little “Change Oil” light when it comes on in your head.
Rest
Now, you’ve changed the oil and fueled the vehicle, but the engine still won’t turn over. It’s all gravy. Give a few seconds… or a few hours, and just rest it. Go to sleep. Your whole being needs it. Rest and reset.
To be successful in a graduate program, especially when balancing life and other things in your life, you must know when to stop and rest. For me, between work and class in my first master’s degree program, that meant finding a bench in a hidden hallway on campus and taking a snooze. As I grew older, that meant setting a bedtime earlier and going to sleep before the sun goes to sleep. You must find the right time for you to reset your body, so you can turn your engine over to do the next assignment, to take in the next lecture, or to simply walk into class. Your success depends on it.
So, whether you are coasting forward on cruise control and putting the blinker on to get in the fast lane, you must understand how to fuel your mind and body, how to listen to the signals and vent, and how to hit reset and count some sheep.
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