Author: UofL University Writing Center

Capability and Procrastination: De-stigmatizing How We Labor

Kendyl Harmeling, Assistant Director for Graduate Student Writing

I had a lot of small, unformed ideas on what to write this blog post about. Knowing I had this task in advance, I spent the last few weeks musing over what I could spend the couple hundred words in this space discussing. My guiding question in these considerations was: what about writing, writing centers, process, or the UofL community feels most relevant and useful to reflect on here and now? I thought about potentially discussing campus trends toward the virtual and multimodal; or about the importance of both in-person and virtual writing communities; or exploring digital sustainability in debates on waste and AI. But amid all these thoughts on what to write – on how to use this space – I’ve been struggling in a combination of family-related emergencies and bodily/mental exhaustion. And now that it’s writing time, deadline day, I’m here with a few drafted-and-deleted ideas. In line with Andrew’s recent post on writer’s block, I offer here a play-by-play of my writer’s block, how I am processing it, and considerations on combating both internal and external stigma on “procrastination.”

A Mid-Morning Scene: As I write this, it is 12:48pm. I opened this document at 10:00am. I’ve played with the formatting, bolding and un-bolding potential titles, changing font sizes and adding page numbers to re-format them. A few times, I’ve gotten so lucky as to get a sentence or two on the page. But shortly after they appear, I revoke them. And I’m left with a blank page again. I read and re-read the UWC blog posts from this semester to see if there’s anything I have to add that’s in line with what’s already been talked about, or if there’s anything new to cover. I return to my blank screen and write some key words. But I don’t feel connected to them. I delete them, like their earlier sentence-ancestors I deleted a half an hour ago. I close my eyes and try to conjure a topic, or a gripping scene I can narrate into a more writerly discussion.

It’s been stormy lately – is there anything to that? Can I use the tornado sirens as a metaphor? Do I have anything to say? More times passes, and I un-bold and delete the placeholder word “title” from the top left corner. I take a short break to get water. I return to a still blank page because, shockingly, a ghost hasn’t appeared and begun to type for me while I was in the kitchen. The more time passes, the more anxiety I can feel in my fingertips and behind my ears. It manifests in the form of my heartbeat. Shame and embarrassment start to bubble up – others got their blog posts done, probably way more on time than me – why can’t I do this? END SCENE.

When I was in undergrad, I used to plan to write my assignments just before the deadline to combat this feeling. If I had the most urgent pressure – less than 48 hours to produce a document – I could get my work done. And, though it wasn’t all the time, it was normally work that I was proud of once I had done it. I knew that my friends didn’t work like this, that their time management was better than mine by light years. Someone I worked with once shamed me for this, saying that it was not only my own personal failure to rise to the level of productivity that college work required but also it was a general issue of people my age. This has stuck with me for years, now in a PhD program and still unable to regularly and routinely get my work done “productively.” Notwithstanding discussions of neurodivergence, disability and ableism, and how these affect labor and capitalism’s expectations for productivity, this line of thought is toxic to hold yourself to and to hold others to more generally. It’s damaging, and even as I write this, I feel the echoes of that stigma attempting to shame me for writing this when I am able to – and not when a system or a social norm excepts me to.

Not only are breaks important to take in academia and in any work environment, as Charlie’s January blog post implores, but too it’s essential to validate your work processes. I work how I work – and I get the work I need to do done in a manner that works for me. It is not a failure of my productivity to use what resources I have to complete a task. It is especially not a failure to use resources that social norms and capitalistic expectation stigmatize the use of. If you need to use time as a resource, it shouldn’t only be valid to use it in extension; tactically using deadlines to complete labor is just as useful to the person it benefits as planning labor out months in advance for someone else.

In medical ethics and philosophy, there’s a concept called “the capabilities approach,” which is used to evaluate the equity and justice of medical access. The capability to access medical services is one step, but the functional ability to use them is another. This outlook on justice isn’t located solely in medicine – it affects every aspect of life. Take, for example, a wheelchair-user who needs to take the bus to get to the grocery store after a snowstorm. The city doesn’t shovel sidewalks, and though the bus is wheelchair accessible and there is a sidewalk for the individual to use to get to the bus, the city’s inability to shovel the snow and ice hinders this person’s functional ability to use the bus – despite the capability to do so that the bus lift and sidewalk offer them. The capabilities approach applies much the same to writing or work-related labor. Having the capability to write is one thing – and is expected of us as college students and workers. But having the functional ability, whether due to inaccessible processes or internal challenges, varies for each of us even down to the day. And, if we feel functionally unable to meet our capability, shame sets in. We must all work to validate, and not stigmatize, the ways we need to function in order to meet our capabilities – if that is what we want to do.

Abiding by someone else’s metric for function, for ability, for productivity and correct process is not a restorative approach to your own bodily and mental well-being. Further, holding others to your metric for function and productivity is ableist atop being reductive and stigmatizing. It also reinforces the harmful systems which already marginalize, disable, and exclude, let alone harms your relationships with those you’re not allowing to work in the ways that they need to. Everyone benefits when we are all not only allowed but encouraged to be “productive” in ways that we individually and communally make meaningful, despite the overarching capitalist social norm. We are not sustainable resources – we do not have endless wells of energy inside us, and we must tend to what we have with nurturing care. Do not burn out for this system, but work through it tactically. Be mindful of how your body and mind speak to you about your energy – and work how it feels most useful and helpful to you. I need to work close to deadlines – regardless of how many have and will tell me that’s wrong. I know my process and my work better than anyone, and you know yourself. Respect that process, restore your energy, and relax. Most importantly, know that however you labor is valid.

Using Your Voice: Why you Should Take a Risk and Write

Katie Fritsche, Writing Consultant

I know a lot of us sometimes think we don’t have a voice that matters to the world of writing. In fact, as human beings, we are sometimes so terrified of others finding out what we think, that we hide our poetry, our greatest work in the notebooks under our pillows and in our desk drawers, trying to work up the courage to share our voice but never really doing so because of what happens if people learn about the deepest part of ourselves: our thoughts.

In fact, you might be surprised to find that writing way back in the old days of Socrates, was not encouraged. Socrates once said that “When it has once been written down, every discourse roams about everywhere, reaching indiscriminately those with understanding no less than those who have no business with it, and it doesn’t know to whom it should speak and to whom it should not. And when it is faulted and attacked unfairly, it always needs its father’s support; alone, it can neither defend itself nor come to its own support” (Kalantzis & Scope 1). Socrates even himself criticized writing, and that there were dangers of lending our own voice to such a discourse, because after all, once it’s been written down, how can we undo it? How can we undo our voice that has been written out in such bold letters? Do we want to? Many critics might ask the question: it worth it for us to write, because isn’t there a danger that comes with putting our voice into something?

I would answer differently. I would answer that using our voice in writing, taking that risk, is important because we get to share the deepest parts of our lives with the world. To write with our voice is to help us feel human. To share our story is to become vulnerable, but it also inspires this creativity that drives us to become better through a written understanding of the world. Writing with one’s voice and sharing it seems like a big leap, but at the same time, I think it can be completely, truly said that if we don’t try, then we will never know. Such power exists from writing down our thoughts for the world to hear, it inspires healing for other people, it creates changes for us to network with others, and writing with our voice can even create future career opportunity that value the fact that we can think independently. I think that when we write, when we take that risk, whilst we may be opening up the doors to a lot of consequence, we are also opening up the doors to our future, because in this day and age, we need people who aren’t afraid to be outspoken, to speak their minds, because writing is admitting we have the right to express who we are.

And so, I say write, write with your own unique voice, open those drawers, take the book of notes and pen you have hidden, and make an attempt to share that voice with the world. Be it through publishing peer review, writing groups, or simply scheduling a writing center appointment in person to talk about your writing, I encourage you to share yourself with this world. Socrates is wrong: writing does have value! Take your voice, let it fly, and write yourself into the future.

Works Cited:

Socrates on the Forgetfulness That Comes with Writing. Kalantziz & Scope, https://newlearningonline.com/literacies/chapter-1/socrates-on-the-forgetfulness-that-comes-with-writing.

When Covid-19 can be a Blessing: Empathy and Change in the Writing Center

Mahde Hassan, Writing Consultant

When Covid began a couple of years ago, it seemed to us a curse, but after profound thoughts during the quarantine days, I figured out that it has implicitly taught us how valuable life is. There is not a single country which was not struck by the deadly Covid-19. Countless people died of Covid regardless of age and nationality, which resulted in tremendous panic and anxiety. Despite the huge number of people dying from Covid, we are still alive. Like me, many others would have taken it for granted that we will be living for a long time without being sick and that staying healthy is a right, not a privilege because Covid has made us feel vulnerable. When we regard staying healthy and staying alive as our right, we are less likely to be grateful for our sound health and life to God. Once we fail to realize the value of our life, we barely make the full use of it, being less careful about empathy and kindness.

Panic and anxiety that resulted from the deaths and infections of Covid made us the passengers of the same boat. Deaths and infections caused from the pandemic were not only seen in one single country, but across the globe. We may have been a citizen of one country, but the worrying atmosphere posed by the pandemic made all of us shaky and we all fought together to get over the situation. Because we all at times went through this critical moment, we have learned how to empathize with people around us. Interestingly, when we work with writers at the University Writing Center, we prioritize practicing empathy. As writers go through many stages of writing, they may get stuck, or they might not have any idea of where to begin one project and where to end it. But we patiently try to understand their struggles and offer as much support as we can. Although I knew empathy is one of the factors responsible for making a leader stand out, I would not have felt the need to practice it in real life unless I had experienced such an excruciating situation caused by the pandemic.

Furthermore, the pandemic has brought about a considerable transformation in the ways we approach virtual writing center work. While before the pandemic people including me used to think virtual appointments as the last option which is not so effective, we now regard them as being as productive as in-person appointments. When I needed to book a virtual appointment, I often took it for granted that this was going to be ineffective. On the other hand, in terms of consulting at the Virtual Writing Center, I had no idea of how to make the most out of the virtual appointments. Now that the pandemic made us more exposed to virtual appointments, I have learned how to make live video chat appointments and written feedback sessions more fruitful. In fact, while virtual hours were not filled up quite often prior to the pandemic, the demand for virtual appointments has climbed up significantly resulting in an added number of hours from the University Writing Center. Due to this change, people can still benefit from written feedback even without attending the appointments physically.

On top of that, the pandemic has made us open to change. Those who were used to shopping physically have been accustomed to shopping online. Leaders who tend to think work from home hampers productivity have let their employees work from home. People who found traveling enjoyable found joy in other activities. When it comes to writing, it is beneficial to be open to changes. For instance, I may have written the first draft of a paper and considered it the best and the final draft, having a prejudice that I need not take others feedback to improve it. Nevertheless, in reality, the more we revise and edit, the better we can make the paper. In the process of revision and editing, it is indispensable to accept criticism and constructive feedback. The moment when I can hold a mindset of changing something based on any of consultants’ feedback or simply a friend’s feedback, my paper and writing skills grow quickly. Thus, the pandemic has taught us to be open to changes and it brings out something better mostly.

The pandemic demonstrated that a simple, invisible pandemic can disrupt everything, not just in a single country, but throughout the world. So, NO—we cannot do whatever we want in life: we should care for humanity. We should be cutting off our bad habits and trying to add values to others’ lives by being honest and empathetic. No matter what we have been doing for years, we always have chances to reflect on what we are doing and reconsider what we should do to make the world a better place to live. Unless a global tragedy comes in and disrupts our regular activity, our “devil self” might not have realized that we are sent to this world with a purpose. We cannot randomly do things that can worsen people’s lives and experiences. And when we become more compassionate with our surroundings, it makes an impact. So, when I look back to the Covid-stricken years, I find myself happy thinking about the fact that I learned to appreciate what I have and be more empathetic in life regardless of where I’m working and where I am living. I’m now more open to change, thanks to Covid-19. Covid-19 is an eye-opener for me.

The Importance of Reading the Syllabus and Assignment Sheets

Yuan Zhao, Writing Consultant

Not until recently did I notice that not all the students read emails, people tend to neglect group text messages, and I know most of you will skip this blog post. But please don’t apply such non-reading strategies to your syllabus and assignment sheets. In contrast, I suggest you read the following two types of documents—syllabus and assignment sheets—very closely.

For this term, in addition to working at the University Writing Center, I also teach one first-year composition class. This double identity gives me a lens to observe students’ reading behaviors to the abovementioned two documents and the possible inconvenient consequences. When opening a writer’s Writing Center appointment form, I usually see a writing draft uploaded by the writer, but not often do I see the assignment sheet. Even though sometimes, writers copy and paste parts of the assignment requirements to the appointment form, as a Writing Center consultant, I still expect more information relevant to the writing tasks. The in-person consultations are fine, but situations can be less ideal if it is a Virtual Writing Center appointment for written feedback. Without assignment sheets or writing prompts as references, it is hard for Writing Center consultants to decide whether the writing projects address or deviate from the expected topics. In consequence, Writing Center consultants can only pay more attention to local issues, such as the mechanism within paragraphs, transitions, topic sentences, formatting, and language styles, while it is comparatively difficult for them to give feedback on higher-level concerns, such as thesis statements, or whether the organization or evidence employed in the draft address the requirements of the writing task.

In the very first class of the first-year composition courses, I led students to read the syllabus and discuss the assignment sheets. But we all forget things, and forgetting is a process that we need to fight against, so after a few weeks, I did not feel surprised to receive student submissions that failed to meet the requirements of the assignment sheets. Some of them missed the due time without emailing me for an extension; some submitted a Google Doc link while the assignment sheet specifically required a Microsoft Word document; some seldom followed the required MLA or APA styles, collaging the font choice, spacing, margins, and headers/title pages. From their performance, I know they did not revisit the assignment sheets closely before submitting the papers. If students choose not to read the assignment sheets even before the due time of submission, when will they read them?

According to the course description for ENG102, one of the learning outcomes is that students’ writing should “analyze the needs of an audience and the requirements of the assignment or task.” Reading syllabus and assignment sheets closely is one crucial step to approaching that learning outcome. In addition, the first-year composition classrooms might be the first chance (and sometimes, the last chance) for a writing instructor to explain in the most meticulous manner the significance of different writing conventions and how they work in college. It means some instructors teaching intermediate or advanced courses might suppose students know well the basics of academic writing since they have completed the first-year composition courses. However, in some cases, students can fail their expectations. If some do not learn enough composition knowledge, I do hope they at least learn some skills to conduct learning—to know where to look for the assigned composition requirements. In fact, within the syllabus and assignment sheets, we can always find the resources that instruct us on what we should do.

Why Should We Read the Syllabus

A syllabus might be less directly relevant to writing tasks, but it is a framing document for the whole course where we can find detailed information. For example, some instructors allow extensions, while others can be very strict on the time to submit assignments. According to the details in the class policies, students can predict what kind of assignment writing strategies they can employ before submitting their projects. For another example, most syllabi contain a section for assigned reading lists. When reading the class plan and the list of assigned readings, students can notice clues for the course design, and sometimes can get themselves better prepared for the class by reading the materials in advance. In addition to the course policies, some instructors include various university resources in their syllabi, and as far as I know, most students skip reading them. For sure, it is not necessary to read them closely. Just a kind reminder, if you encounter some difficulties and need assistance at the campus, besides using Google or ChatGPT to look for answers, your syllabus often contains more direct answers for what you need.

Why Should We Read Assignment Sheets

If a syllabus provides us with scaffolding instructions on what a course expects us to do, what assignment sheets offer is often something more practical and manageable. For a particular writing task, reading prompts from an assignment sheet can inform a writer what topic they should be attentive to, what arguments they might head to, and what evidence or examples they should prepare. Reading prompts is more like conducting a reading comprehension quiz. Sometimes, highlighting the key phrases in the prompts can be very helpful. From the highlighted keywords, we can always refer to our class readings and see if there are potential connections we can make so that we can transfer them into writing. The assigned reading materials sometimes are great sources when students need to include evidence or examples, and some instructors prefer seeing students doing so. Their preference lies in that instructors know the reading materials well and it is convenient for them to provide more engaging feedback. In addition, if the assignment has some particular formatting requirements, please guarantee your writing project follows them strictly. Prior to reading your writing content, instructors read your paper format first. The formatting details from your writing often lead instructors to take it for granted whether you are serious about your writing. As a side note, you can also find useful information about format editing from the webpage of the University Writing Center, including the most updated MLA, APA, and Chicago styles.

Don’t Read Your Assignment Sheet Alone

Now, I assume you will read your assignment sheet closely, highlighting the keywords and checking the specific formatting requirements. I also understand that after applying the close reading strategies, you might still be confused about the writing tasks. Don’t leave the confusion unresolved before you embark on your writing. In addition to reading alone, you should read your assignment sheets with other people. First and foremost, whenever you find something unclear that needs further explanations in the assignment, you can always make use of instructors’ office hours to raise your concerns. Reading with your instructor who is also the author of the assignment sheet is the most effective approach to untangling the confusion. Second, you can read with your classmates. In fact, when you read the assignment sheets with your peers, you are doing something more than teasing out the requirements of the assignment sheets, since you are working as a literacy community. Since you and your peers know a lot about the course context, when reading the assignment sheets, why don’t you brainstorm for the writing task? Everyone can roughly share their writing purposes, outlines, resources and even discuss some practical writing strategies to address instructors’ expectations for the writing projects. By listening to your peers’ writing plans, you can build and revise your writing plans, too. Finally, you are always more than welcome to read the assignment sheets with the University Writing Center consultants. And I highly suggest you do so when you make an appointment with us. All of the consultants are experienced graduate students and some of us have teaching experience. Based on your verbal descriptions about the project and the written requirements from the assignment sheets, we can offer constructive feedback addressing your project, and hopefully, we can help boost your confidence to help you become a better writer.

Reading syllabi and assignment sheets cultivates important professional reading skills. It is the prerequisite condition to writing, which requires specific responses to meet the requirements of different tasks. The reading activity entails responsibilities as a reader, a communicator, an executor, and a writer. As a responsible reader, you have to read the materials closely; as a reliable communicator, you are expected to talk to different parties to make sure you understand the tasks; as an executor, you have to make decisions on what to write and how to write it; and as a dedicated writer, you compose a writing product as a response to a series of specific requirements. So start your writing by reading the syllabus and assignment sheets.

How to Write While Traveling

Elizabeth Pope, Writing Consultant

Traveling abroad and throughout the National Parks of the United States formed the bedrock of my undergraduate and graduate education. I began travel writing in my twenties, which consisted of a leather-bound journal that was tied with a string, rather than bound with a lock. The journal was an atlas of maps and keys of language that only I might understand rather than linear prose. There were train numbers to catch from Zurich to Rome, Paris to Versailles, Munich to Amsterdam, and London to Stratford-Upon-Avon. At a bed and breakfast in the town where Shakespeare was born in Stratford-Upon-Avon, I—absent-mindedly—left my travel journal 20 years ago on a wooden table with lace doilies and a blush oil lamp.

There were names of objects that I stumbled onto in museums like a piece of the Berlin Wall that was spray-painted “Change Your Life.” There were scribbled streets that led to the Père Lachaise Cemetery in Paris where Oscar Wilde was buried. There was a recipe for the traditional British breakfast that I ate the morning I lost my journal. Blood pudding resides in a crevasse of my mind that does not vanish—the way blood pudding looked blackened as a briquet of coal, eggs yolk-up and runny, baked beans in a tomato gravy, mushrooms sautéed, warm tomatoes, marmalade, and black tea. Names of ruins and eroding statues of goddesses within the fountains forming the roman streets led me back to gelato or mussels cooked in lemony saffron, wine, and saltwater at that restaurant down the street from the Colosseum in Rome—that I might never return to but recall through association of hunger that pulled me through landscapes.

I’ve often thought of the poem lost in those pages, left in England at the bed and breakfast, like an artifact for someone else to discover. I think of the map inside that journal that led to the restaurant in Interlaken, where cattle herds rounded the center of the city, where I shared Rösti, a giant pancake of potatoes—dripping in beer and butter—before hiking the Swiss Alps, before taking the Grindelwald Terminal (a sky-lift) to Jungfraujoch and the observatory, where snow whips in artic winds, where it’s impossible to walk in the wind at peaks of 11,000 feet above sea level. And it’s for that reason, I’ve never traveled with such a fine leather-bound journal again. A journal like that might eventually slip from fingers by negligence, wind, or distraction over long voyages with interchanges of trains, trams, sky-lifts, and airplanes; or while camping and hiking through rural and rough terrain.

Now, I travel with small notebooks and only write words, brief phrases, and maps that lead to impressions while in a specific scene to jog my memory. I practice presence while traveling. I refrain from a montage of pictures, but I do take photo journals of images that I wish to remember like the mirage restaurant with a wooden windmill and a ghost train that appeared after hours of desolate Icelandic rock and moss-scape through the passenger windows as we traveled from Sioux Falls to Badlands National Park. Or the sun setting over the Badlands when I wanted to remember eroding mountains as a monument to our ecological existence, the process of erosion by a river—the way the White River and Cheyenne River eroded millions of years of rock deposits to form a landscape that looks like an extraterrestrial glacial melt desert. Or the way the fossils felt as though they were crumbling under our feet as we ascended to one of the many summits that form the silhouette of the Badlands. I worked to remember that vantage were everything is exposed and eternal gorges with plates of rock form a superposition of coverings, as if to protect the oldest layers of earth. I worked to remember that the elements were careless. Exposed layers of earth in South Dakota disappear through harsh winters, thunderstorms that rock the sky with lightening and belt so loud it sounds like the earth is cracking, and winds that fall into themselves to form tornadoes that move through campgrounds to disappear as if they never existed.

I worked to remember bison from our time in South Dakota—its brindle coat that growths thick like an insulated wall to melt snow and subsist subzero temperatures, its head as beast-like as a minotaur, large as a rhinoceros, and royal as a lion arriving out of the visage of the grasslands in herds. I worked to remember the terror and electricity of standing close enough to touch a buffalo that wandered from the herd. The buffalo that walked beside my sister and posed for that one singular good photograph before the herd formed a wall in the road. High on adrenaline from such closeness, we blindly failed to consider that with a single bow of a horn that buffalo might flip us into air and trample us into the prairie dogs that kept peeping up like jack-n-the boxes.

Some images are hard to forget while traveling, especially when delays and detours occur. Like when the RV in front of us in the Black Hills lodged and stuck in the natural tunnel of the Needles, landmasses of granite that rise out of the mountains like cathedrals. The Needles ascend like petrified staffs of the gods and goddesses, or stalagmites. Traveling journal, in situ, shouldn’t be a novel of hours spent writing prose or poems. A travel journal should consist of signals, keys, places, names, and locations to remember to tell someone to visit. A travel journal should be shared so that others can locate the experience. Although there is never a replication of a singular experience, like the sunset we stumbled on while driving Wilderness Loop where we fed wild horses and wild burros in South Dakota. That sunset will never look or feel the same for the next person who visits that exact location any other time in history. In that sunset we were tired, dirty from camping, and enamored with the expanse of a landscape that we never knew existed before placing our feet on the ground and looking around.

I kept a travel log to remember waking up our ragged, sleepy children from tree hammocks and tents at the campsite in Acadia National Park at 3 a.m.to watch the first sunrise hit the continental United States on Cadillac Mountain in Maine. It’s the coffee that I remember most around camp in the morning, bits of grounds floating in the aluminum percolator, coal dark coffee, the salt that forms on the rim of your skin when you wake beside the rock cliffs of Maine, the way the glacial lake steals your breath after jumping from the granite boulders forming the natural pools that rest in the Black Hills of South Dakota. Travel logs are reserved for the moments you might be stuck in traffic or around a campfire when everyone is tired, dishes are washed, food is in bear-proof storage away from the tents and hammocks, and the everyone is too tired to eat the marshmallows they’ve roasted. Travel writing is a moment of reflection in mind, memory, word, or picture. It’s something that is written quickly so that you can revisit it again when you arrive home. Then, at home—when you’re sick for another adventure—that’s the time to unearth notes, pictures, and memories to piece together the trip.

In Pursuit of Creating a Better World

Mahde Hassan, Writing Consultant

Give me a good writer, I’ll give you a better world. There are people who love writing but there are also people who are reluctant to write much. Those who have not a keen interest in writing can be very good readers and thus find huge enthusiasm in reading and knowing new things, thereby changing perspectives and gaining a positive mindset on things around us. Have you imagined that a good writer could bring about positive changes in society along with making the world better by promoting love, empathy, kindness, and equality?

As a University Writing Center consultant at the University of Louisville, I work with writers across many disciplines. In the conference sessions, one of my prime goals is to promote love, empathy, and equality in addition to aid them to be better writers by being welcoming, making them feel comfortable, not being dominant in the conversations and offering them notes on the session.

When a writer walks in an appointment, the first thing I do is that I always try to be welcoming to them. Sometimes I find them from the disciplines I know much about and other times I find them from the disciplines that I am not deeply knowledgeable of. But since I was trained on how to offer feedback on any papers, I don’t hesitate to try to help. I enjoy helping them because I see them being great writers and having an impact on this with their writing skill. Besides that, I let the writers settle in in the first couple of minutes of the appointments without rushing much about the assignment they work on.

In the appointments, I also try to make the writers feel comfortable right from the beginning so that they can inform me of their concerns. For that I prefer asking questions outside the assignments they are working on. Sometimes I ask them “How was the week?”, “How are you?” or simply I ask, “How your semester has been going on so far?”. I also share any interesting memory I have related to their answers and the major they are pursuing. I try to make them feel at home with that kind of attitude.

Most importantly, I love being a good listener rather than talking more or controlling the conversations. Not being dominant in the conversations with the writers allows me to figure out the concerns and struggles they have associated with that assignment or work. Furthermore, I try to make them feel valued and important. It, in turn, brings about surprising benefits to me. Once they feel valued, they never hesitate to share everything they want to know or are confused about. There comes the best opportunity for me to serve them. When I offer insights, I also ask for their opinions time to time instead of talking for a long time at a stretch so that the conferences become engaging. Hence, this mindset helps me enormously to listen to all they might have to say and empathize while offering them suggestions. I not only offer suggestions but also ensure that they understand why and how bringing something new to their paper or taking out something can lead their paper to be a better one. Sometimes, I attempt to keep them motivated by only pointing out what they did amazingly in a paper initially. And listening to them first helps me the most to hear their perspectives and struggles, and thus thinking of improving the paper puts me in their shoes.

Finally, I ensure that they have some notes about our discussion on their way back from the Writing Center. In case the writers start working on the assignment or project a few days after the appointment, they can look back at the suggestions I have made. In that way, they would feel confident with getting started or working further on a paper. Throughout the appointments, I try to spread love, be compassionate and be equal to every writer. My core goal is to help them be better writers, but I also bring those traits into place when running the appointment to promote a better world. If at least some writers out of the hundreds of appointments I am dealing with can pass on the kindness, empathy and love they receive along with capitalizing the skills they grow from the writing center, it is highly likely that the world can change radically. That’s why I believe whatever position we work in, we always have opportunities to promote empathy and kindness. It eventually creates a better world. When I am nice to others in my profession, a message of spreading love, empathy and equality is also conveyed to them implicitly. Once upon a time there were not many technological advancements, but neither were there as many crimes, wars, terrorism attacks and natural disasters as there are now. Hence, I believe each of us needs to be mindful of spreading empathy, equality, and kindness through whatever role we work in to bring back the peace.

Ode to a Writer’s Callus

Wendell Hixson, Writing Consultant

When I was young, really young, I had a hard time differentiating my right from my left. I was a victim of the condescending phrase for the directionally-compromised: “your other left.” And no, the “L” and left-hand trick didn’t work. In the moment, the shape of the “L” would always escape me, so the left-hand trick was useless. I was a directionless little wanderer. However, due to countless lessons in cursive and my proclivity for writing way too much, I had quickly developed a writer’s callus. After seeing the little bump on my ring finger and asking about it, my parents told me that it had come from how I write with my right hand. Now, that actually stuck with me. From then on, I would always remember where my writer’s callus was, and I knew which side was my right. Luckily, I still have this little writer’s bump. I admit that I still use this trick and yield that, in the moment, I still forget what an “L” looks like. That’s against the point. This anecdote was really just a longwinded way of emphasizing an often ignored reality: writing is a physical experience, not just an emotional one.

For starters, how many people have a routine? And I don’t just mean a writing routine. I mean a routine for writing. I know, for me, that I need to be sat comfortably at a desk, a little chilly, in front of a window, and supplied with a sandwich and glass of water before I’ve entered into my ideal writing mood. While it’s good to learn how to effectively write in all situations, there is nothing wrong with having a personal routine that you employ to feel inspired and prepared. There’s also a lot of fun and comfort to be found in discovering what inspires you best. Remember, there is nothing wrong with treating yourself a little to some creature comforts before you write. Writing is intensive. It’s taxing. It’s vulnerable. It can leave you feeling exhausted, exhilarated, anxious, confident, confined, freed, or all of the above. It affects you, the writer, just as much as you affect the page. Sometimes this can even come at higher costs than we care to usually talk about.

As teachers, students, workers, writers, we all understand the reality of college. Most of us will stay up late, toiling over some assignment or research project, calling to the Muses in hopes that our blank page will suddenly fill with the words we need for an “A.” But, do we often enough acknowledge the toll this can take on our bodies? Writing isn’t a purely mental exercise, and—much like most physical exercise—shouldn’t be overdone. (I recommend also reading writing consultant Andrew Messer’s recent blog on burnout and writer’s block, as well as Charlie Ward’s latest blog on self-care.) Learn how to relax and find the proper times to make a daily “exercise” out of your writing, if possible. To further our metaphor, take time to exercise different aspects of your writing. Sometimes it’s good to simply write your papers, other times it proves useful to practice your skills in revising and editing, and other times still it’s good to remember that seeking guidance and even just reading are also wonderful ways to strengthen your skills.

However, writing shouldn’t be seen as all school-based work or business reports. I think that the most neglected physical aspect of writing, especially in school and the workforce, is how writing can also be for your own enjoyment. When we journal, when we physically write poetry, when we practice our 8 billion current forms of uniquely wonderful handwriting, we create a very personal little treasure. I recommend writing down something personal or something meaningful to yourself. Typing onto a screen, I believe, is extremely useful, but it can also separate us from what makes writings, books, and letters so wonderful. It requires a concerted effort to take a pen to paper and more effort still to preserve what has been created. Like a personal museum or library, in writing things down on paper, there is a compelling drive to keep it safe and able to be called forth at later dates. When writing letters, there is a valued and rewarding feeling in exerting so much effort on something that is to be given to another. It reminds us that writing has been commodified and streamlined, but it is, primarily, a work of art that we value as a record of our thoughts, feelings, and history. Is there not something endearing about a close friend’s own emotions and thoughts transferred to the page in their own distinctive hand? Is there not something rewarding about your lines of poetry or prose taking as much physical effort to create as mental effort? Is there not something meaningful in the simple thoughts we may have scribbled years ago about a wonderful day we’ve since forgotten?

At risk of overstaying my welcome, I want to stress that writing is always from and for you in some regard. It takes a lot out of you. Realistically, it will always be a demanding experience, but in the best way. So, try to always give what you can for school or work or what have you, but don’t forget that it’s your work. It’s your skill. It’s your effort that you pour yourself into. By creating and holding on to something tangible, you will also hold on to something that demonstrates the effort, the emotion, and the part of you that you had to give to create it. Hopefully, in realizing that you’ve physically created something so potentially meaningful, you can literally grasp how valuable and useful your writing can be. And, in the end—if you’re still not convinced—writing things down could make a little bump on your finger that might occasionally help with your rights and lefts, especially if you forget what an “L” looks like. Still pretty worth it, I think.

Writer’s Block: The Inevitable and Surmountable Adversity

Andrew Messer, Writing Consultant

Have you ever stared at a blank page for ten, twenty, or thirty minutes, the desire or need to write clawing in your head desperate to get out onto the page but you just can’t write it down? You can’t formulate or articulate the ideas in your head onto a page, typing away at your keyboard and then erasing the paragraph you wrote for some reason that you may or may not have made up? Me too: in fact, I’d wager that if you came to the University Writing Center at any given time of any given day of any given year and worked with any consultant that has ever worked there, they would have had the same problem. Even sitting here typing away at my screen I worry about it. Will my ideas flow? Will they make sense? Is this even worth writing? It is. I promise it is, and it goes away.

There is no magical way to get rid of it either, or if it is I am waiting just as patiently as the next person to be told what it is; however, I promise it is surmountable. And while there is no magic cure-all of sage, lavender, and bitterroot, I believe there are some strategies that I have developed over the years that have proven to be quite helpful in overcoming this small compositionary plague. So, if you have a minute or two, read on and I’ll impart to you my wisdoms.

Step Away

Charlie mentioned this in their last blog post on self-care, and I want to mention it here because I think it is an excellent piece of advice: step away, take a break. Even if you’ve just sat down to write, sometimes what the brain needs is just some time away. Go for a walk, take a nap (who cares if you woke up three hours ago), get a snack (or a meal if you haven’t already), or just do something that makes you happy. Mood and emotions are pivotal in how one goes about their writing process, and if you feel the weight of stress bearing down upon your shoulders while you stare blankly at the white rectangle on the word processor, then you likely won’t feel like writing. At least, if you’re like me, you won’t even feel like you can.

You can’t overlook the power of a solid break. It can be long or short, and that may very well be for you to feel out in the moment. But your brain is good at telling you what you need to do, and sometimes writer’s block is simply a way for your brain to tell you to step back, take a breather, and come back again once you feel more refreshed and invigorated. I know from personal experience how much more comfortable I feel working when I have done something for myself just before.

Read

It may sound deceptively simple, but I promise you it can work wonders. It can be helpful to take a break from your screen when you’re trying to write and you find yourself stuck, but when you do it might not always be the best idea to turn your attention to another—though there is something to be said for watching a show to calm down if you are panicking. However, I find that when I can’t quite put words to my thoughts, reading really turns the cogs in my brain much faster than any other stimuli.

And when I say read, I don’t have anything particular in mind. Sometimes rereading your sources can be helpful and can help you to materialize your thoughts; sometimes you need a break from the assignment altogether and you may feel yourself drawn to the novel you are reading. Either way it will get you away from the page and give you some much needed space from the intellectual work that is required of you—yes, that includes staring at a blank page trying to force your thoughts onto the page like you were technopath. And even if you haven’t started writing yet, this can be a helpful strategy to loosen up some thoughts and warm your brain up to the writing process even before the writer’s block has hit you.

Ask for Help

It’s never easy to admit that you need help, but sometimes it’s just what you need to get your ideas rolling. For me, I always like to have someone look over a draft that I am working on before I finish it. Even for this blog post, I asked someone I trust to look it over before I finished it! In my own experience writing can sometimes get stuck when I’m in the middle of working my way through it, so I highly recommend to get a second opinion when this feels like the case.

I promise this wasn’t just a way of making this a signpost for the University Writing Center, but it is an incredibly useful service chock full of excellent people who know the struggles of writing and writer’s block and can empathize with your own struggles. So, if you’ve thrown the kitchen sink at the problem and the page remains as blank as ever, try throwing the shower drain too and come see us. We’d love to help see you through it!

Poetry as a Form of Journaling for Inner Peace

Braydon Dungan, Writing Consultant

Journaling has become a common method for many individuals looking to begin a journey of healing and mindfulness. Journaling can be a great way to write down one’s thoughts as they come, removing any unwanted images that revolve around our mind and evicting them onto a sheet of paper. Something about taking the thoughts inside our head and placing them onto something tangible allows us to feel seen, to feel heard, to feel listened to.

Trauma can show itself in many forms and can arise from a variety of different circumstances. I know peers who experience trauma due to the death of a loved one, the effect of a poor mental health diagnosis, or the aftereffects of an abusive relationship. For me, I’ve struggled with speaking out about the trauma I’ve endured at the hands of those who wished to manipulate and abuse me. I’ve been conditioned to compartmentalize the abuse I’ve endured, and I’ve had to learn how to process the pain of the past in a way conducive to my own healing and mental health.

For some, journaling doesn’t have that helpful effect that it does on others. Journaling can seem difficult to maintain on a consistent basis, and it can often seem like an obstacle in a day already filled with plenty of challenges. In result, I’ve attempted to shift from journaling to writing poetry. Now, I don’t see myself as any sort of talented writer of poetry whatsoever; in fact, I’ve never really had much formal training in writing poetry at all. Still, I wanted to give it a shot due to my inadequacy at maintaining a consistent journaling schedule.

I’ve noticed that when I use poetry as a form of journaling, I’m able to ruminate and process the thoughts I have much more carefully than when I journal in a stream-of-consciousness manner. When I journal, I don’t really think about what I’m thinking… I simply recognize the thought in my head, transfer it to paper, and move onto the next thought.

With poetry, I force myself to visualize the words that swirl in my head, and I have to create abstract images and metaphors that relay the emotions I want to communicate to my intended audience. I don’t worry about poetry structure or rhythm; instead, I solely focus on the words, themselves, and the power each word brings to my page.

One of the most common manners I write poetry is directly towards an individual in my life. Sometimes, I write poetry about my family, and I allow myself to process and reflect on the love and positive emotions I have towards them. On the other hand, I also write about people who have pained me in the past, individuals who have taken it upon themselves to incur manipulation, deceit, and hate into my life.

I want to include a short poem I wrote in the middle of the night upon waking up from a trauma-induced nightmare:

my fear of drowning.

there were nights i used to wonder

if the void was worth the risk

of taking that first breath of water

i never wanted to feel it burn

like it did in the nightmares i had

of you with anybody else but me

I wasn’t sure how I could illustrate exactly how I felt. I didn’t want to write down what happened in my nightmare and force myself to relive it; instead, I just wanted to process what had happened, and one of the most effective ways to do this was by comparing my trauma to the painful act of drowning. I didn’t write this to wallow in my sorrows or to draw attention to myself; I wrote this for me, for healing, for the place I want to be, the place I strive to get to every day of my life.

Now, when I talk to those around me who struggle with their own trauma and mental health challenges, I encourage them to use poetry as journaling.

And now, I challenge you; take a moment, close your eyes, and allow whichever thoughts that naturally creep in to be recognized and not shoved away. Take five minutes and write yourself a quick poem; think of metaphors, images, senses. Don’t worry about rhyming or the structure of your poem—just write!

I can assure you that after writing your poem, you will feel more clearheaded than you did before. Let’s all take an opportunity out of our hectic, challenging days to ruminate on our thoughts and turn them into something beautiful, powerful, and tangible.

The Importance of Breaks in Academia

Charlie Ward, Writing Consultant

At times, it may feel as though education is all consuming. As a student, your life — and, ultimately, your identity — becomes entrenched by course readings and research projects. For me, balancing the mental load of helping writers with their projects — while also trying to do my own writing projects — becomes a bit too much around the middle of the semester. I love helping people, but I often forget to help myself. The pressure I feel to be the perfect consultant, the perfect student, the perfect child, and the perfect partner all become too much to handle; the pressures of academia make me sick with anxiety. I know it’s okay to cry — and hopefully that’s a lesson you’re learning, too — but you need other coping methods. Sometimes, you need to take a break.

It may also feel as though you don’t have much time for anything beyond academics; the idea of taking time for yourself may cause you guilt and anxiety. The relentless “culture of productivity,” or, the social climate that reinforces overworking yourself, may make it difficult for you to feel like you can take a break. But you can — and I’m here to tell you that.

Here are some tips that may help you:

Force yourself to take a break.

Realistically, this is step one: humans need time to breathe, time to create, and time to be comforted. It’s easier said than done, but don’t let “productivity culture” make you feel like you can’t take a few minutes to yourself. Don’t let peers dissuade you, either. Painting a still life, going for a walk, listening to your favorite album, or even just looking outside are great ways to readjust mentally.

I know I’m kind of preaching to the choir here, but this time to destress is crucial. If you’re a planner, plan your break; if you’re spontaneous, stop your work early one evening. Time to relax will prevent an inevitable breakdown, whether it be the result of an overloaded schedule or other excruciating factors. This break time has helped me through hard times — I promise everything will sort itself out.

Keep work and home separate.

I’m not referring to physical space here, but rather the workload between work and home. I usually do the majority of my work for the upcoming week during my weekends; however, I only allow myself to work from 9 am – 5 pm. By giving myself the evening to relax, I’m able to get up the next morning more motivated to work. Try to find an hour where you stop working: a huge weight will be lifted off your shoulders.

Try not to talk too much about work when not at work. I know this is seemingly impossible — I definitely fall into ruts where I talk about nothing but my work — but you need to find something else to talk about. You can talk about the weather, you can talk about the new Netflix special you just watched, or you can commiserate on how much you hate the month of January — it just needs to be something not related to work. It will help give your brain a break from the constant stresses of academia.

Don’t be afraid to ask for help.

There comes a time where we need a bit more than a break: things can become too much, things can become too loud, and things can become impossible to do on your own. When this happens, it’s more than okay to ask for help.

The cultural stigma against mental health can make it difficult to ask for help; these situations are exacerbated by feelings of guilt and anxiety, whether they be the result of academia or other factors. Conversations around the importance of breaks and community are extremely important in promoting self-advocacy.

I understand the hesitation towards taking a break, especially for students and people who just need to get stuff done. On the other hand, I also understand what it looks like when you don’t take a break: I’ve had semesters where I stopped showing up to classes, semesters where I’ve dropped classes, semesters where I failed classes. I was too scared to ask for help, and I had dug myself into a rut — productivity had clouded my ability to think clearly, and ultimately, I felt the only way I could cope with the stress was to stop being me for a while. This sounds dark, but I just want to emphasize the importance of making time for yourself.

In graduate school, I made a pact with myself to always take time if I need it. I made a pact that I would always take an hour or two to do whatever I want, even when my workload seems endless. I’m not here to tell you that I’ve been entirely without anxiety, but I’ve been able to stay above water — and that’s okay!

This semester, remember to take a break. It doesn’t matter whether it’s five minutes or five hours: take time to understand who you are and what makes you happy. Try to bottle up that happiness — whether it be memories of your pets or how the sun makes you feel — and look back on it in moments of stress. You can always change your assignments or your research, but don’t let them change you.