Ben K. D. Pearce: Some rules that help me maintain my peace in this busy career

Ben K. D. Pearce, Postdoctoral Fellow in the Hörst lab at Johns Hopkins University, shared on X/Twitter:

“In academia, there is always work to do. So, I’ve developed some rules that help me maintain my peace in this busy career.

• No meetings on Mondays.
  Mondays for me are for catching up on work and e-mails. This helps me feel productive at the beginning of every week.
• Deactivate e-mail notifications on my phone.
  If I’m not at work physically, I’m not going to be there mentally either. Seeing incoming e-mails tends to bring my mind back to work when I should be giving myself downtime.
• Take a mid-day walk to get a coffee.
  I cherish my afternoon coffee time. I use it to call my family, chat with friends on WhatsApp, or just sit and meditate.
• Define a good day’s work as making good progress towards your goals. Not by the time you were at your desk.
  Academia isn’t like shift work. If I’ve made a solid amount of progress after 6 hours in the office and my brain is completely wiped, I’ll go home (gasp!) early.

I’m stoked to hear that so many of you follow these or your own versions of them! I also want to say that I wasn’t always capable of setting boundaries like these. If you also struggle to say no, know that people with healthy boundaries will respect you more for setting yours.

And anyone who takes issue when you set boundaries like this, really needs those boundaries to be set the most.”

Source: Ben K. D. Pearce/Twitter.