2.22 What to do if you want more reassurance

Wouldn't it be nice if sometimes someone just told us that we were doing a good job, that we were enough, that we were doing things well enough and that they were proud of us. And yet so often, that doesn't necessarily happen in academia. Lots of us feel that our supervisors could give us more reassurance, our collaborators or heads of school could give us more reassurance, and it's really hard to keep pushing yourself to work as hard as we all do, when we feel like we're not getting the praise and reassurance from other people that we think would really help. In today's episode, we're going to be thinking about what you can do about that. And, clue, it's not all about asking other people for reassurance. 

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I'm Dr Vikki Wright, ex-Professor and certified life coach and I help everyone from PhD students to full Professors to get a bit less overwhelmed and thrive in academia. My weekly podcast, The PhD Life Coach covers the most common issues experienced in universities, including procrastination, imposter syndrome, and having too much to do. I give inspiring and actionable advice and often have fun expert guests join me on the show. Make sure you subscribe on Apple, Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts.

If you already listen, please find time to rate, review and tell your friends! 

I also host a free online community for academics at every level. You can sign up on my website, The PhD Life Coach.com - you'll receive regular emails with helpful tips and access to free online group coaching every single month! Come join and get the support you need.

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I'm Dr Vikki Wright, ex-Professor and certified life coach and I help everyone from PhD students to full Professors to get a bit less overwhelmed and thrive in academia. Please make sure you subscribe, and I would love it if you could find time to rate, review and tell your friends! You can send them this universal link that will work whatever the podcast app they use. http://pod.link/1650551306?i=1000695434464

I also host a free online community for academics at every level. You can sign up on my website, The PhD Life Coach. com - you'll receive regular emails with helpful tips and access to free online group coaching every single month! Come join and get the support you need.

Transcript

Wouldn't it be nice if sometimes someone just told us that we were doing a good job, that we were enough, that we were doing things well enough and that they were proud of us. And yet so often, that doesn't necessarily happen in academia. Lots of us feel that our supervisors could give us more reassurance, our collaborators or heads of school could give us more reassurance, and it's really hard to keep pushing yourself to work as hard as we all do, when we feel like we're not getting the praise and reassurance from other people that we think would really help. In today's episode, we're going to be thinking about what you can do about that. And, clue, it's not all about asking other people for reassurance. 

Hello

and welcome to episode 22 of the PhD Life Coach, where we're thinking about what you can do if you don't get enough reassurance. This is something that comes up a lot with my clients at pretty much every stage of the academic journey. That they just wish somebody would let them know whether they're doing things right or not. Whether they're doing enough. Whether they're performing at the level that they're expected to be. And this is really understandable, right? 

Academia is a really kind of intangible place. It's really hard to judge whether we're doing as much work as other people, whether we're the standard we should be, whether we're focusing on the right things. And often the kind of goal setting and review processes are pretty fluffy.

You know, most universities will have like monthly reviews or something for PhD students. They'll have maybe annual performance reviews for academics, but they're few and far between, and often they can be a bit of a paper pushing tick box exercise if they're not done well. Maybe one day I'll do an episode on how to make the most out of those review processes.

But for the moment It's enough to say that structurally there aren't many opportunities to get reassurance and praise from others. And sometimes even when we have success, we get publications, we pass parts of our PhD, you know, we pass our progress panels or whatever it might be. We still aren't sure whether we passed really easily, were we like flying colours, top of the class, or were we just good enough, scraped through. It can be really hard to figure out. 

And that means that we can end up feeling really quite uncertain about our abilities, about our standing, how we're doing, whether we should be pushing harder, whether we can sort of take our foot off the gas a little bit. And it also means if we're really sort of desperate for this reassurance, we can start turning up a bit needy.

And this is something I see a lot. You guys might have seen it in personal relationships as well. When you're feeling sort of a bit insecure, maybe in the early stages of dating. So when I was still single and I was sort of on dating apps and things like that, if there was somebody that I quite liked and I wasn't sure what they were thinking about me, I'd be sort of pushing to get little bits of reassurance, right?

And we know in that context, that's not hot. That's not attractive to be sort of going, do you like me? How much do you like me? Do you like me enough? Um, and unfortunately, the same is true in academia. If we're saying to our supervisors all the time, or to our Heads of School, am I doing enough? Am I doing the right things?

Then sometimes we end up showing up as somebody who doesn't trust their own judgment, showing up as somebody who kind of is putting other people under pressure to reassure us and make us feel a particular way. 

It also means that we sometimes start doing tasks in order to get reassurance. So one of the things I see a lot with my clients is they find it easier to prioritize tasks that are for somebody else than tasks that are for themselves.

So if somebody has set you a deadline to get a draft done, you're much more likely to hit that deadline than if you've set yourself a deadline to get a draft done. You're much more likely to prioritize getting your marking done for some other module organizer than you are for planning ahead for your own module, for example.

When we're in need of reassurance for others, we prioritize tasks where we're more likely to get that praise and reassurance. And in doing so, we then end up neglecting things that are actually really important for us and our careers. Things that are real priorities for us.

So, in this episode, I'm going to give you some really practical tips about what you can do if you find that you are feeling in need of some more reassurance and even finding yourself seeking out reassurance from others. 

First thing is, we're just not going to judge ourselves. It's totally understandable. As I say, it's a complex world, we don't know necessarily whether we're doing it well, and it's nice to be praised by others. So, let's not beat ourselves up, let's go at this compassionately, this is something that we want to address and we want to learn some skills around. But there's nothing wrong with us for the fact that we quite like getting praise and reassurance, okay? There's nothing wrong with you. But let's figure out some alternative ways of doing it.

The first one is to notice reassurance you're already getting. I remember getting, and I can't remember whether I've ever talked about this on the podcast before, but I remember getting my first ever module reviews back when I'd done some teaching for my old supervisor, and 95 percent of the comments were really good, you know, she's enthusiastic, she was clear, she was this, that, the other, and then a few were she went a bit too fast. One told me I was sarcastic. outrageous. Now I'm like, yeah, but at the time I was outraged. Um, and what we often do is we disregard the good ones and we focus in on the things that reinforce the things that we're worried about. And partly that's a problem because it means we're focusing on something that actually reinforces our worst fears.

But it also means we're missing an opportunity to get reassurance. There's a known phenomenon that's part of the imposter syndrome, and I talk about it in the course I do on how to overcome imposter syndrome. It's available for universities.

And that is that when we receive praise or reassurance, if we're somebody who kind of doubts ourselves and feels like a bit of an imposter sometimes, we disregard that praise and feedback, either on the grounds that I only did well because I was lucky, or on the grounds that I only did well because I worked really, really, really, really, really hard and so it doesn't really count, because I exhausted myself trying to do it. 

Sometimes we disregard it on account of the fact, yeah, it looked alright on the surface, but they didn't know how chaotic it was behind the scenes. They didn't know how late I was up. They don't know how there was a couple of bits that I just winged, or whatever.

And so we sort of, instead of taking this reassurance, this reassurance that we really want. Instead of taking this reassurance, we disregard it. We say that, oh no, not that sort of reassurance. That doesn't count. That's not really evidence that I'm doing well enough. That's not really evidence that I'm good enough.

They're only saying it to be nice. They're only saying it because I was lucky this time. So the first real lesson here is to notice reassurance you're already getting. Some people only give reassurance in a very kind of throwaway remark. Ah, you did well this week. And then carry on. Grab it. Grab it and remember that.

I used to keep, and I recommend all of you do if you don't already, I used to keep a folder of nice things people say. That was what it was called. Nice things people say. And if anybody ever sent me an email thanking me for anything, I popped it in the nice things people say file. And it's a really nice place to look.

I also used to keep all my thank you cards from students. Loved having those. So keep anything you get, and then when you're feeling like you never get enough reassurance. You can revisit these things. So you notice the stuff you get, you keep the stuff you get, and you can revisit the stuff you get.

Because I guarantee all of you are getting a lot more praise and reassurance than you are giving yourselves credit for at the moment.

The second thing you can do is seek specific reassurance. And I want you to really notice that word, specific. When we say things like Am I doing well enough? Am I about up to speed? Am I where I should be? Really generic reassurance. Then it can be a little bit annoying to be on the receiving end of that because you feel like you're just like, yes, yes, you're fine, you're fine, stop worrying.

You feel like you're having to manage that person's emotions, to manage your emotions. But also it's hard to, I mean, that's a big question. Am I good enough? Good enough for what? So if you want reassurance, one thing you can do is get really specific about exactly what do you want reassurance about? What is it that you're worried about?

Is it that you're not far enough through the research that you're doing at the moment? Is it that you're all good enough at writing, whatever good enough means? Get really specific and ask for advice about that thing. That way you're much more likely to get focused advice. You're much more likely to get something that's actually specific and useful. And if people tell you that actually there are some things that you do need to develop, you get much more specific advice because, you know, if you say to somebody, am I doing well enough? If they say yes, That's really easy to disregard, because it's like, oh, well, they don't know. But if they say no, what does that even mean? What are you going to do with that? So if you're going to seek praise and reassurance, get really, really specific about what you're asking for feedback on.

You can also look for evidence as reassurance. Sometimes we only count praise and reassurance if it's in the form of somebody saying, You're doing really well, Vikki. I'm proud of you. You're doing really well. When in reality, a bunch of people don't say those things. But if they keep coming back to you to ask you to do something, then that's praise in itself, that means they trust you to do that job.

If they give you relatively minor edits, or thorough edits, but no sort of really big structural changes, the absence of heavy critique is reassurance in itself. This was something I really had to work on as a supervisor, because my tendency, if I was giving feedback to a student, I'm going through a manuscript, and I'm trying to do it in a hurry, as always, because we've all got too much to do.

My tendency would be to focus in on the bits they had to change. And I got feedback from students that sometimes it was really good to know what they'd done well, partly from a getting a reassurance point of view, and partly from the point of view of actually learning why it was done well. And so I had to really train myself to comment on paragraphs that I thought were fine and explain why I thought they were fine, as well as comment on paragraphs that I thought needed to change.

So is that something that I learned as a supervisor? Maybe your supervisor doesn't do that. Maybe your collaborators don't do that. But one of the things that I asked my students to do in parallel is, if you give me a manuscript and I've got a couple of paragraphs that I haven't put comments on, that means I think they're good.

Yeah, give me the benefit of the doubt here. I'm going to try and put more positive feedback in your work, because you said you'd like that and I can see why that would help. But if I haven't, and there's no comments in that section, let's take that as praise. Okay, so look for evidence of reassurance, evidence that someone thinks you're doing a good job that goes beyond them just saying, yeah, I think you're doing a good job.

I would also really recommend joining a community of some sort. So all of you who are in departments have colleagues around you, whether you're a PhD student or an academic. But there'll often be other communities that you can join. Groups at the university, writing groups, at the University of Birmingham we have my PhD Life Coach membership, that's definitely created a community amongst the PhD students.

By having a community where you can kind of cheerlead each other, it can be another source of reassurance and praise. So with my students in the membership, it's wonderful. We had one of our sessions yesterday. They're all in Zoom webinar and getting in the chat and they're telling us about papers they've had published and things and they're all cheering for each other and looking up each other's papers and they're talking about it on social media.

They're sharing in each other's celebrations and they're sharing in each other's successes. So look in your university for opportunities for those sorts of communities. You can build them yourself. These can be just small friendship groups or they can be organized structures. So academics will have access to training programs where you can meet people, um, offered to the things like action learning sets and stuff like that, where you can have people that you meet with regularly, and you actually can give praise and reassurance and champion each other. Look out for all of those opportunities. 

For PhD students and postdocs, if you're listening to this in real time, it's the beginning of February. I am very excited to announce that at the start of April, I am going to have a group coaching program available for PhD students and postdocs to sign up as individuals. 

So as you may know, I have the membership, which is at one university at the moment. It's open to other universities. I am in some discussions at the minute, but that relies on institutions investing and all of those things, which, as we know, can take time and persuasion on my part.

And if you're an individual student, you might think I don't have access to that. Now, all of you have access to my free monthly coaching which will be on the 14th of February if you're listening to this live. So next Wednesday make sure that you are signed up for my email list if you want to make sure you get the details of that.

But all of you, if you are either a PhD student or a postdoc, will have the option to sign up for my new group coaching program on how to be your own best boss. It's going to be three months. You're going to get workshops. You're going to get coaching sessions. You're going to get my ebook on how to be your own best boss.

It's going to be amazing and it's going to be an incredible community. You are going to get to know each other. You're going to champion each other. You're going to meet people that you can work with outside of this on zoom, where you can provide support and reassurance and praise for each other. 

If you want to make sure you get all the information about it, it's literally, it's not even open to purchase yet, it is just at the being launched stage right now, then make sure that you are on my email mailing list. So go to www. thephdlifecoach. com, click on work with me and you'll find my mailing list there, make sure that you are signed up there and you'll get all the information.

If you are listening to this a bit later, it's going to start on the 3rd of April. So you've got till the 3rd of April to sign up. So get in touch if you want more details. It's going to be amazing. 

Even if you don't go into a program like that, though, there's other places that you can get free community. Make sure you're doing that. Make sure you're celebrating your friends. Making sure you're sharing with them the things you're doing. So you can get that reassurance and praise from your peers. 

Now, if you're an academic You might be saying, oh, but what about us? Like I say, there are places at your university you can find these things. You can build collaborative groups where you can do this for yourselves. But if you think I should run a group program for academics, let me know. Drop me an email. It's sort of tootling along in the back of my mind. I'm being careful not to do too many things at once, which is always my tendency. But it is tootling along in the back of my mind. A group program for people who are more senior than a postdoc, who are at any stage of their academic career. Possibly over the summer, possibly a have the best summer ever kind of vibe. So that we rest when we want to rest, we write when we want to write, we get stuff done and actually enjoy it. Let me know whether you feel like that would be useful. I feel like it might be. 

Anyway, I'm getting distracted from reassurance and praise, but I hope that was a useful sneaky insight for you all. So how else can you get more reassurance and praise?

My next tip is probably the most important of all of them, which is I want you to ask yourself, when did you last give yourself reassurance and praise? I hear so many clients say, I just need them to tell me I'm doing a good job, and I always ask, When was the last time you told you, you were doing a good job?

What proportion of the time do you tell yourself you're doing a good job, versus what proportion of the time do you spend telling yourself you should be doing more? That you're not enough? That this isn't good enough? 

If we're wanting more reassurance and praise from others, we could almost always be giving more reassurance and praise to ourselves.

Now, some of you will say, as clients have said to me in the past, Yeah, but I don't know if I'm doing enough. I don't know if it's good enough. So I don't trust my judgment. And the way I always answer that is You're trusting your judgment that it's not enough at the moment. You're believing yourself when you tell yourself you're not good enough.

And you're believing yourself when you're telling yourself you're not working hard enough. Or that you're working as hard as you possibly can be and it's still not enough. You're believing all of those things. Why do we trust our judgment on what we're bad at, and not trust our judgment on what we're doing well at?

We need to start saying things to ourselves that we do believe. Oh, you worked hard today, Vic. Good work. Things like that. Not, you're the best writer ever. We don't need to say that to ourselves. We need to acknowledge when we've tried hard. We need to acknowledge when something's successful. We need to acknowledge that there are things that we're doing well. The more we can try and get in the habit of reassuring ourselves, and at least reducing the amount that we're actively rubbishing ourselves, the less we find we need reassurance from other people. 

Because usually, when moaning we're not hearing it from others, it's because we need to hear it from ourselves. It's not just that it's the easiest thing to change, because we've got control over our own behaviour much more than anybody else's. It's not just a pragmatic thing.

We need to hear it from ourselves. We need to tell ourselves that we're enough and that we're doing enough and that we're doing a good job within the constraints that we have. 

I used to have a little cartoon in the pandemic, which was just this little guy with a little sign. It's like a little cartoony man with a little sign, that said, Under the circumstances, you're doing rather well. And I thought, you know what? That basically sums it up. Under the circumstances, whether it's the pandemic or just the general higher education sector, you're doing rather well. And I think we can all tell ourselves that a little bit more often.

My next tip is we delve a little deeper and we ask ourselves, why do I need this reassurance? How do I anticipate feeling if somebody told me I was doing a good job? And why do I feel Like, I need to, and why do I think I need to feel that way? Because sometimes what we're looking for is for somebody to take away discomfort.

At the moment, we're feeling like something's difficult, we're feeling uncertain, and we feel like somebody else's praise will take away some of that uncertainty, or it'll make it feel a little easier, give us a little bit more confidence that we're able to do it. But if we can get to the bottom of why you feel like you need that, we can address that need directly.

So instead of thinking, I need praise because I need to feel more confident about my abilities, we can think, how can I feel more confident about my abilities? So we don't work on getting the praise, we work on building our confidence in the things that we're trying to do

if we want praise because we feel disconnected and isolated and lonely and all of these things. Then we go, Oh, I want reassurance just so that I feel connected to somebody else. Well, I could work on just feeling connected to somebody else, and there's a lot better ways to build relationships and to build connectedness than asking for praise. 

 Is it because I want acknowledgement? Is it that I'm working really hard and I want someone to recognize that, because even that, we don't necessarily have to ask for praise. Then we can make sure that, okay, I need to make clear to somebody how many hours I'm working, what I'm getting done, so that they acknowledge it. So they can actually see how much I'm doing. We can address these needs more directly if we understand where these more superficial needs are coming from. 

And then my final tip, is sometimes we look for praise and reassurance because we don't like feeling uncertain.

We don't like not knowing if we're good enough, not knowing if we can finish on time, not knowing if we can get everything done before the end of term, whatever your goals are. It's really hard to not know. It can feel really uncomfortable to not know. And so we seek reassurance and praise from others to reduce that discomfort.

The final tip is knowing that we can choose to get a bit better at managing that uncertainty. So instead of having to make the uncertainty go away with reassurance, Being okay with not knowing whether I can finish this whole thing or not. Being able to direct our attention to, I don't know if I can finish this whole thing by September, but I do know that I can do this bit today and being able to direct our focus to that. 

Being able to remind ourselves it's okay to be uncertain. To go back to my dating analogies, it's okay at the beginning of a relationship to not be sure where it's going. It's okay to have those levels of uncertainty, and if anything, I would say it's healthy to have those levels of uncertainty.

At the beginning of a relationship, It's not your job to know whether it's a forever relationship or not. That comes later. In the same way, it's not your job right now to know whether you can do your entire PhD in this amount of time. Your job right now is to know whether you can do this task now. 

More we can direct the focus to that and kind of get used to the fact that there's nothing inherently unsafe about being uncertain. That we can direct ourselves to the things where we do feel more certain and we can allow ourselves to feel uncertain about the other stuff, then suddenly we're in much less need of reassurance, because we don't need these negative emotions to go away, these uncomfortable emotions to go away, because we trust we can look after ourselves while we feel uncertain. We trust that we trust that whatever happens we'll figure it out.

My final one is you can borrow a bit of reassurance from me. I am confident that anybody who spends their spare time listening to podcasts called the PhD Life Coach is doing all right.

You're putting the time in. You're thinking about your practice. You're trying to do the best you can. You're actively learning how to regulate your thoughts and emotions so that you can be successful and still look after your mental health. If you're choosing to listen to this sort of thing, take the reassurance from me as a starting point that I think you're doing just fine.

Thank you so much for listening, everyone. Make sure you sign up for my mailing list to hear more about my group programs and I will see you next week.