Self-Compassionate Professor

I announce my FREE workshop series, "Digest, Rest, and Envision," which will be offered May 23, May 24, and May 25 in one-hour sessions. Tuesday's workshop will help you to process emotions left over from the academic year. Wednesday's workshop will help you to rest and trust the process of rest. Thursday's workshop will help you to envision a new way of doing your career, based on wellness and self-compassion.

In this episode, I also offer a strategy to navigate end-of-semester stress: 1) Climbing back into your body, 2) Feeling and listening to your emotions, 3) Finding trust that this process is time well spent, and 4) Taking Martha Beck's "3Bs" strategy (bag it, barter it, better it) to your to-do list. You may find the written version of this guide as well as my upcoming career wellness workshops here: https://danielledelamare.com/ 

Dr. Kimine Mayuzumi discusses her graduate school journey as an advocate for change in academia, her research and blog writing about the need for academics to slow down and be lazy, and how academics may apply elements of the Japanese Tea Ceremony to their work so they can come to enjoy their work more. Find the blog post she refers to here:  https://lazyslowdown.com/where-are-our-feelings-of-guilt-and-shame-coming-from/. Find Kimine at https://lazyslowdown.com/. Sign up for Kimine's free "anxiety to serenity" session at https://api.leadconnectorhq.com/widget/appointment/lazyslowdown/anxiety2serenity

I describe the ways academic institutions socialize us into deficit thinking where we often come to believe we are not enough. And while having a deficit thought or story is not a problem in and of itself, believing such stories and allowing them to drive our careers is a big problem. I talk about how to disrupt this type of thinking as well as how to regulate your nervous system when you find yourself in a fight/flight state due to deficit thinking. Enroll for the sabbatical program here: https://danielledelamare.com/?page_id=1047

In this interview conducted by Dr. Sanne Frandsen in her Facebook group, Next Level Career Community for Women in Academia, Sanne interviews Dr. Patrice Buzzanell. Patrice explains what led her to academia, how her motherhood journey began in graduate school, her struggles, and the great success she has enjoyed overall in her academic career while also raising six children. Patrice also discusses her research about motherhood, women, and career as well as her experiences of being truly lit up by the coming together of her research in a way she had not imagined. Find Dr. Patrice Buzzanell at [email protected] and Dr. Sanne Frandsen at https://www.sannefrandsen.com/ or find her Facebook group. Reach out to me, Danielle De La Mare, on LinkedIn or email me at [email protected].

Continuing with our theme of connections, I discuss how all roads lead back to Dr. Sanne Frandsen! In this episode, I introduce Sanne as next week's guest host and tell several fun stories of connection and coincidence. I also re-release my interview with Sanne where she describes the power of narrative, explaining how many of our career problems manifest from the stories we tell ourselves. She offers two specific examples: how feelings of inadequacy and time poverty are often issues of mindset and can likely be managed by telling a new story. Sanne also explains that in career crises, people must navigate through messy and ongoing narrative changes until they are able to find something that fits. Find Dr. Sanne Frandsen at https://www.sannefrandsen.com, on LinkedIn at Sanne Frandsen, and in her Facebook group, Next Level- Career Community for Women in Academia, a group open to academic women anywhere in Europe.

In the spirit of connecting to those beyond our immediate circles, I re-release my interview with Dr. Alex Ketchum, author of Engage in Public Scholarship: A Guidebook on Feminist and Accessible Communication. Alex explains the value of engaging in public scholarship--a hopeful message for individual scholars, the academy generally, as well as society at large. She also describes her own experiences doing public scholarship, the need for broader engagement with academic research in our society, as well as the risks and challenges of doing such work. Follow Dr. Alex Ketchum on Twitter: @ketchum22.

Dr. David Mendes, creator and host of the Papa PhD Podcast, explains when and why he began the podcast, the waves of uncertainty he has undergone throughout his career, how he has transformed, and how meaningful conversations have fueled his transformation. Also, catch my interview with David on the Papa PhD podcast on March 2, 2023! Find David on Twitter and Instagram at @papaphdpodcast, on LinkedIn at David Mendes, Papa PhD, or on YouTube at Papa PhD. 

(For those seeking greater career wellness, schedule a 20-minute consult with Danielle De La Mare here: https://app.acuityscheduling.com/schedule.php?owner=18296021&appointmentType=11383525)

Dr. James Hedges, Dean of the Division of Online and Continuing Education at Weber State University in Ogden, Utah, discusses his career journey from faculty to administration. He also offers lessons learned: chaos can create opportunities, negotiation and confidence is key, discussing workplace issues with colleagues is important and therapeutic, and opening to and accepting ambiguity and failure is necessary, among others.

Corona Pritchard discusses how the burnout she experienced in her work was largely due to organizational dysfunction, her decision to make a career pivot, and the challenges around identity she encountered when she arrived in her new position. She also discusses what a healthy organization looks like as well as how to implement wellness practices into your life. Corona too asks us to consider this difficult question: "How would it change the way you approach your work if you understood that your first job was to be the healthiest person in the room?" Find Corona Pritchard at https://www.coronapritchard.com/. Also, find her on LinkedIn and Instagram. (Schedule a consult with Danielle De La Mare here: https://app.acuityscheduling.com/schedule.php?owner=18296021&appointmentType=11383525.)