Everyone who’s been through a PhD knows this.

You can be researching the most interesting topic and still there will be times when you’re bored, fed up, burnt out and just don’t want to do the work. These times are pretty painful. You don’t progress. You feel bad about yourself. You doubt your abilities.

These times can be quite long.

So long, you might even consider quitting the PhD. Of course, that’s always an option. But often, all you need is to change some things about your work conditions to revive the spark.

Here are four simple steps that might help you find joy in your work again:

1.     Do an assessment: What about your work do you like? Maybe you love the creative discussion part. Or you can get excited about doing figures or writing. Or you love the hands-on nature of experiments or field work. Write down every small or big task you like about your work.

2.     What exactly is it that demotivates you? Repeat step 1 but this time list all the “anti-fun” tasks. 

3.     Ask yourself: When do you most need a quick dose of motivation? Maybe you need some to get you started in the morning. Or you struggle to get back to your desk after the lunch break. Or you would love a reward after doing a particularly annoying task.

4.     Go to your schedule distribute tasks according to your rhythm. Make sure you schedule all the tedious and the fun tasks with a concrete time. Of course, you can always deviate but allocating time will help you to

a)     Not procrastinate the annoying tasks by doing just fun stuff

b)    Not get so absorbed in the boring stuff until it sucked up all your motivation. This will help you not fall into a motivational valley over the long run.

Have you experienced such periods of demotivation in your PhD? How did you deal with them?