It's a marathon, not a sprint

On the day of the London Marathon, it's an opportune time to reflect on the nature of doing research. As a young researcher getting to grips with the finer detail of ontology and epistemology and all that jazz, i'm never quite sure where all this is heading, but i've always loved learning and i've got loads of questions that i want to know the answers to (although i know it's not that simple), but i don't know how i might go about asking them. Now a runner, looking forward to their next race, would go about the 'answering' of that particular question by setting themselves a goal, preparing for it by putting time aside to train and probably mix and match their preparation methods to give them a decent range of experiences and aptitudes for the big day. You have goals, you have a time in mind in which you want to finish, you practise and that helps you work out how good you might be and therefore what you might be able to achieve, or at least it tells you what you need to do to improve and so on.

Now doesn't that sound somewhat similar to doing research? So what might my goals be? Well, i can't think about the end yet because i have no idea what it looks like, but i can break it down, focus on short or medium term goals and then push on from there. Whereas doing a BA or an MA might be equivalent to a sprint or a middle distance, the PhD is definitely a marathon of sorts. But the goal of this marathon of mine stretches beyond the PhD itself - it is to become a better, more rounded academic and as far as i can articulate what that means it is about becoming a good lecturer, one who creates an enjoyable and interesting learning environment for students and also a good researcher, one who wants to push forward the boundaries of his own understanding to help him with his teaching and help his students learn productively and deeply.

And somewhere along that journey there is "getting the PhD" - perhaps that's the equivalent of realising you've got to start incorporating speed or track work into your marathon training if you're really going to become any good, if you're really going to be able to push on at 20, 21 miles when the burn sets in and you hit the dreaded wall - but it is not the 'final' end point, it's just another step on the way. So perhaps this PhD is simply my first marathon and like any good runner knows, you've got to deal with what's in front of you first before you can dream about how good you might one day be.