Julia Strand 0:02 Hello, and welcome to The Juice and the Squeeze. I'm Julia Strand here as always with my co-host, Jonathan Peelle. Hi, Jonathan. Jonathan Peelle 0:10 Hi, Julia. Julia Strand 0:11 Happy New Year! Jonathan Peelle 0:13 Yeah. Happy New Year to you. Julia Strand 0:15 ...which is what you say on the first episode you have recorded in a given year. Jonathan Peelle 0:20 Yeah. Even if it's in April Julia Strand 0:22 even if it's an April. It's been it's been a hot minute since we've since we've chatted together. Jonathan, why haven't we recorded anything since December? Jonathan Peelle 0:32 I don't know! Pandemic? And being overextended, I think are the two, the two right answers to that. Julia Strand 0:38 Yeah, um, dearest listeners, I want you to know that we have been mindful of neglecting you. And actually, Jonathan and I now have a really nice, weekly tradition, where we typically record on Fridays, and on Thursdays, one of us sends a Slack message and says, my (fill in the blank) is now sick, or I am sick, or because the children have been sick recently, they can't go to daycare or something like that. It's a really nice little Thursday check-in we do it just to find out who is sick and how hard things have been. Jonathan Peelle 1:12 Right, right, whose school is closed, who's sick, there's like, we could almost do a form letter. Right with like, just a few drop down, like five drop down options. And some combination of those is like always...yeah. Julia Strand 1:23 Yeah, I realize all of the kids and all of the grown ups were healthy enough to go to their respective workplaces t his week. Here we are, in mid-April...And the last time that happened was in February. Jonathan Peelle 1:35 Yeah. Well, congratulations. Julia Strand 1:37 Thank you, you know, what rules is getting to go to work five days in a week. And, and I and honestly, the hardest thing about this is that, you know, when it's kids getting sick, or they can't go to school, because there's a COVID outbreak, or like one of those things. It's just that all of a sudden, unexpectedly, you have to change everything. It's not that there's less like, I feel like, if I was just told you're only gonna get three to four days of work a week, I could plan and schedule and like, try to find a way to make that work. But it's just, you know, it's just spinning the Roulette Wheel Of like, what's gonna happen today? Oh, I guess there's no lab meeting this week, or I guess I'm doing teaching this week or whatever. So the unpredictability, yeah. Which leads us to what we wanted to talk about today. So it seems apropos to talk about kind of, in a way being overextended. And we've we've talked a bit before, on Juice and Squeeze about how we manage our commitments and how we decide what to say no to there is in fact, an episode called a bucket of no's...a pile of no's... Jonathan Peelle 2:42 a pile Julia Strand 2:42 a pile of nose, spelled N O S, not N O S, E. Which in which we talk about, like how we decide what to say no to in order to facilitate what we what we want to say yes to. Um, so what we wanted to talk about today, is this, this kind of chronic overextension that many of us feel, but not about how it affects us as faculty as much, but about if there are ways that we are perpetuating this culture of overextension with our trainees, like if there are ways that we can help the next generation of academic scientists, human beings in general, be less pressured to feel over extended the way that that many of us do. And we can we break the culture? Can we can we change things for the better? And maybe along the way, find some things that we ourselves can do, as well. Jonathan Peelle 3:39 I mean, one of the one of the challenges I, I really liked that, if I do say, so myself, I liked that episode we did on a pile of no's, and I still go back and listen to it sometimes. And all the stuff I said I would work on, like, I don't know if I've gotten any better at it, just between us. So there's definitely, like, definitely a theme in my life of that being challenging. And so, I mean, yes, I would love to help other people, people in the lab and other students to kind of get a handle on this early on. But also, it is one of those things where I feel like it's hard for me to do myself, and that makes it also hard to, you know, model, model positive behavior for others. So anyway, I'm looking forward to, um, to talking about this today. Julia Strand 4:24 Yeah, I mean, and maybe by thinking about if there are ways that we are inflicting our neuroses on our you, no intellectual children. That might also help us figure out ways to do better ourselves. Yeah. I have felt like if, if I had reliable childcare at this point where I am right now, I feel like I'm doing a reasonable number of things. Like I have felt overextended, but it's because I'm trying to do a five day amount of work and in three days, most weeks, but I feel like I feel like I have gotten to a point where I'm doing a reasonable number of things. And that has been in part because I have been saying no to a ton of stuff lately. I've even I've started a document, where I write down all of the things that I have said no to, ah, and it rules, I really like it. I like it. Because it's a nice reminder to look at that and be like that stuff somebody wanted me to do, maybe because they thought I'd be good at it. So it's kind of nice for that. But I also love it, because I when I like, you know, kind of get to the spot where I can see it every once in a while. And when I go back and look at it. I am also like, so relieved that I'm not doing those things right now. And I think, typically, when we say no to things, we the only times we think about it, or when we have this like FOMO of oh, boy, maybe I should have done that. Because I see that other person doing that it looks so cool, how they're doing it. And so keeping a list of the things that I have said no to the past has just been a nice reminder to me of how good it is to say no to things sometimes. Yeah, Jonathan Peelle 6:02 I don't I don't have a list. But I do I often send you a message Julia when I say no to something, because because you can help keep me accountable. And it's hard for me. And there have been a few things this year. Anyway, there are good opportunities that I normally would have said yes to and I kind of paused and pulled up my no card. Julia Strand 6:21 Yeah, good. I also have taken to when I say no to something, rather than telling colleagues about it, I tell my friends about it, because what my friends would like is for me to work less so that I can hang out more, right? So I get a lot of praise from them when I say no to things, because Because Because and honestly, you know what I'm making decisions about the things that I'm going to do or not do these days. Especially given chronic illness. I mean, they're not chronic illnesses, they're recurring normal childhood illnesses. But especially like, given that, if I'm going to take on more stuff that I currently have right now, that is work that is going to have to happen, like on evenings and over the weekend. And so the calculus that I'm really trying to use is, here's an opportunity, would I rather do that? Or like literally would I rather have fun, because it's going to be on nights and weekends are the times that I could be having fun instead. And sometimes there is something that I still want to do, because it's like so important, or I feel strongly enough about or I think it's gonna be good enough for my students or my own professional development or whatever, that I think it's that is more important to me than having fun. But honestly, usually not. So Jonathan Peelle 7:39 well. It's the I think, economics, what is the opportunity cost? Like, what are you giving up to do this thing? And it's really easy to ignore that you're like, I will just keep adding things without, you know, without considering what you have to give up? Julia Strand 7:53 Yeah, right. There's Okay. Dear readers, we have mentioned before a book called 4000 weeks, to be clear, Jonathan has mentioned it before, and recommended it to me. And I forgot, and then read it independently, because somebody else recommended it to me. But I mean, not because I trust it was my husband, not because I trust his judgment more about just he had read it. And he was like, You should really read this and you don't like the difference between someone being like, here's a book for you to read versus someone saying, oh, there's this thing. Anyway, anyway, Jonathan, I read this book on on your recommendation. Kind of. And listeners, it's a great book, we both recommend it. It is it's kind of pitched as like a time management and efficiency book. But I think it's pitched that way in order to like lower in the time management and efficiency crowd, when in fact, it is really a book about how no amount of efficiency and organization will get you past the fact that you can't do all the things you want to do and no matter what, and you spent too much of your life working. Jonathan Peelle 9:02 So not to make it all about us. But the other episode of ours I really like is too much stuff in the closet, which was right around the same time. It was kind of early on in when we were recording it. But that's kind of part of the crux is like at some point, you just reorganizing stuff does not work. You actually have to get rid of stuff. Julia Strand 9:22 Yes. Yeah. And the book is nice, because so 4000 weeks is apparently the length of the average American lifespan. And for some reason, having that number in terms of weeks, really makes I don't like 4000 does not seem like very many. And so that's a nice kind of startle into like yeah, what am I going to spend my weeks on because you're going to spend some of those weeks being sick and some of them, you know, on jury duty. And at that point, there's only a couple left so choose wisely. Choose wisely what you do, and that book has been also been useful for me and kind of thinking about Yeah, what what is worth saying yes to. There's a neat one of the examples that he gives in this. And I think it might be from like Warren Buffett or something like it sounds like business speaking kind of advice. And I don't love everything about it. And I think that it's too rigid and all of that, but let me say it anyway, which is, you make a list of the 25 things that you care the most about doing in your life. And the way that I think many in order, so number one is like the most important thing to you in your life. And I think most of us think you know, that we can like, look at those top five things and be like, these are the ones that I really don't care about, and make sure I kind of want to accomplish, and you think about items, six through 25. And you say, like, these are things that I hope to do kind of if I have time for. And he suggests that that's that's the wrong way of thinking about it that, that you should think about items, six through 25 as the enemy, like, those are the things that are appealing enough that you might spend your time on them at the expense of not spending enough time on items one through five. And I really liked the idea that like, we can say no, it's easy to say no to the stuff you don't want to do. But what's important is saying no to the stuff that you kind of want to do, but you don't really want to do, because there's other stuff that you really want to do more. So I think the number of items in there is overly rigid, and what those things are change over time. And if one of those things, is being a well rounded human being, then sometimes you should just, you know, learn how to crochet even though making things with your hands is not your top five. So like I don't think it's perfect, but but I really like thinking about it in terms of the things that are appealing enough to be dangerous, like appealing enough to like that you will devote more attention to than you want to as as kind of being threats, right? Rather than like if there's if I'm done with everything and there's stuff left over, then I'll do that. But like, No, those are actually the things you have to be particularly wary of, Jonathan Peelle 12:04 to be to be better at your first priorities, whether it's three or five or whatever. Right. I'm so bad at this, Julia, that so we actually we we talked about this on our episode about too much stuff in the closet, which is, which I'll put a link to in the show notes. And the show notes are at juiceandsqueeze.net/46. That's right, Episode 46. But I am so bad at that. And I think that's one of the things I struggle with. And I know we're going to anyway, don't want to go too down the rabbit hole here. But if I knew how everything would turn out, then it'd be easier to say no, right? But it's making it a lot easier with a cheat to make it an easier problem, right? So like if you have 10 Things you want to work on. But I knew the five that were really going to turn out. Well. I'll just focus on those five. Right. But I don't know. And so yeah, it kind of forces you to to be a little bit more focused or just like put your eggs in fewer baskets. Right. And that's what I always want to just like put that number 10 might be the one that that turns out to be super fun, because that's happened before. But probably that's happened at the expensive of other stuff. So yeah, Julia Strand 13:18 yeah, I mean, one of the things he talks about in 4000 weeks is like trying not trying to get over avoiding FOMO, the fear of missing out and just accepting that you're gonna miss out on most things in life. And so you know, there is no, there's no possible digital organizational mechanism that will enable you to experience most of the things that you would get experience, you're just not going to experience most of those. And so I also I really liked that kind of like grim fatalism of like no it Giulia, there when I think about like all the places I want to travel to, for instance, if I want to keep my job and see my family and things like that, there are a very finite number of places in the world that I'm going to see in my life. Right. And like that, that actually like knowing that and coming to terms with the sad reality of that. I feel like it's actually going to make me choose my travel more thoughtfully. Right, like, Jonathan Peelle 14:18 right, because you can't just, you know, see everything Julia Strand 14:20 you can't, you just can't Yeah, so So yeah. So saying no to things and being judicious with what you decide to do. We shouldn't just think about all the things we're missing out on, we should think about, you know, the ways that that enable us to actually do things we want. Okay, so here we are talking about us. But what I really wanted to, I mean, I've been thinking about a lot and I wanted to get your input on Jonathan and I just wanted to force myself to kind of think through some of this stuff is that all of the time, but especially during pandemic days, I talked to so many of my students, so many undergrads, who are these smart, thoughtful, curious, eager, delightful humans to be around. And so many of them are feeling this, this sense of being over extended. For Lord of the Rings fans, the quote that just keeps running through my mind is the scene where Bilbo Baggins, who has had the ring for too long, I'm not going to go into everything for people who go to Lord of the Rings, but he says, I feel thin, sort of stretched, like butter scraped over too much bread. I just love this quote, because this is like, this is how I feel when I'm over extended, there's just like, not enough of me to go around. And it's making this unpleasant scraping sound. There's not enough butter, I am the butter in this metaphor. And I feel like, this is what a lot of my students are experiencing, too, that they are just stretched too thin. And so I want to think about like, why are they stretched too thin? And what can we? What can we do about it? And I think this can apply to anyone that you're in a position of power over, right? Like, it could be undergrads, it could be grad students, it could be employees, it could be postdocs, lab managers, you know, whatever it is, but, but thinking through like, are there things about the culture, that we have some some agency over? That is like, perpetuating this. So when I when I talk to my undergrads, and I have, you know, and I've talked to specific students about this, and I've talked to groups of students about, here's this phenomenon that I'm noticing Do you think it's about? So one option is that, as faculty, we are giving our students too much work, right? Like, they're taking x number of classes, if we want them to have a 40 hour work week, and they're taking four classes, each of us only gets 10 hours of their time. And maybe it's the case that we're actually assigning work that take up 20 hours of their time, and we're just making it literally impossible for them to do their work in a reasonable amount of time. So like, there is just too much work is one option. Another option is that the amount of work is reasonable. But we are not doing enough to help teach our students how to do work efficiently, or how to structure their time well to make the best use of it. And so it's reasonable, but they haven't learned the like, organizational skills and stuff to like, actually do things effectively. Or a third possibility is that like, the academic stuff is reasonable. But students are overextending themselves with like, clubs, and extracurricular things and sports and that they are just like, taking on too many different roles above and beyond, you know, their their work as students. And when I have asked my students, which of those they think it is, they say, probably all three bits. Okay. Are there other? Are there other things that it can be? Those? I mean, those are like the three options that that I have thought of? Yeah, I know Jonathan Peelle 18:12 that probably. I mean, that probably seems to cover it. Julia Strand 18:18 Because, you know, so when we think about like, what we have agency over, Mike Well, I'm a faculty member, and I am the one who gets to decide how much work I assigned for my classes. Right? So so if I thought what the problem was, is we assigned too much reading or there's too many papers to write or something like that, like, that's a really easy thing that we can collectively fix. And I also talk with them a lot about, you know, how do you structure your time? And what kind of planner do you use? And, you know, I, like do some of that stuff, too. But it isn't. I don't know. Like there's, there's isn't like an easy, easy, quick fix for this. Right. So when I when I think about the third thing, the doing too many different things. That the third option, that seems the most like what you and I are experiencing, right, Jonathan like it's not like, we're taking one class that has a lot of reading, it's that we want to do our research plus also be on panels, plus also be editors of journals, and also have roles in professional societies and you know, like, do all of these things in addition to the core of our jobs, which is teaching classes, writing papers, you know, like, doing science. Yeah. And when I see my students being like, super overextended, because in addition to their classes, you know, they're on the Frisbee team and doing lots of day ups and you can get cool cooking class on the side and all of those things. That feels like that feels like the problem that I have, you know, where I'm like, Well, if you just quit the Frisbee team, you would have more time for the other stuff, right the same way. If I quit doing a podcast I'd have Jonathan Peelle 20:09 totally no, I get it right. Yeah, Julia Strand 20:11 but this the juice is worth the squeeze. Whereas being on the Frisbee team might not be for me where I am in my life right now. So how do we get them? How do we get them to? I don't want to just keep saying quit the Frisbee team because frisbee is a really big deal at Carleton, and I would get angry letters. So quit the Quidditch team. Jonathan Peelle 20:39 Also awesome. I would not quit the Quidditch team. Right. But anyway, I get what you're saying. Julia Strand 20:44 I don't know if you have one. Yeah. But, um, so So one of the ways that I, you know, try to make them think about these things, is to talk about my own struggles with it. I tell my lab students when I say no to things, you know, and explain why. When I don't do stuff that I am supposed to do on time, you know, I explained like, what's going on and say, If I think when my term on X organization runs out, I'm not going to renew it, because I want to have more time for for this kind of thing. You know, so I think like, talking about it, is useful. Um, I think also like understanding why why they slash we do it is useful, right? I'm putting on my psychologist hat here. But I think, you know, the students got to Carleton by being clever, eager overachievers, right. And like, studying hard and doing all the stuff and you know, and if, if a lot of our like, if a lot of the reinforcers that we have gotten all of our lives are for being busy and doing lots of stuff, then it should be unsurprising that we're gonna keep doing those things, right? Like, I got into college because I was president of the whatever and to all my classes and to play the oboe, then, you know, when you get to college here to kind of keep keep that pattern up. Jonathan Peelle 22:20 Because they don't give out a lot of awards for like, lack of participation or like, didn't recognize you at your department meeting for like, here's the faculty member who just sat and thought the most. Julia Strand 22:31 But but right, but also, the fact that depth of participation is not quantifiable, I think is a big part of the problem, too. Right. So So at Carleton, we're on trimesters, and so students typically take three classes at a time. And like credits wise, they mostly have to take three sometimes. And also like, depending on number of APS, they bring in and stuff, they can go down to two classes a term some terms. And I often hear students be reluctant to go down to two classes, because, you know, for one, we're paying so much for this, we should be taking as many things as we can. And given that, you know, you you only get to take a finite number of courses in your time at Carleton, and there's so many great ones, you don't want to miss out on taking something really cool. But the fact is that if you take two classes instead of three, when you do the readings, you can do them like slowly and thoroughly. And you can like, look up every word you don't know in the reading. And if it cites something cool, you could go and read that one too, right? And I would actually argue that like doing that is a very different kind of intellectual exercise that is like super rewarding and super educational in a way that like skipping the readings for three classes is not. But we don't have any way of like putting on your transcripts. I read it slowly. And I looked up every word I didn't know. Right, right. And so and so if everything up to this point has been heavy, like credentialing, and, you know, really looking for ways of making yourself look good on paper, I think that really comes like at the expense of real intellectual exploration. Right, and just thinking hard about stuff. So my claim is we should give awards for thinking hard about stuff once we can figure out how to quantify that. Jonathan Peelle 24:31 But it's like a measurement issue. I mean, we get into this with with career stuff, too, right? It's like, we all know that the number of papers someone's published is not a great indicator of, you know, quality or whatever. And yet, it's something we can count. And so people, you know, grant organizations and bosses and whoever like to count things, so yeah, maybe we need to develop a better, better measurement solution for thinking yeah, or thought, you know, Julia Strand 25:01 or help people, I mean, ourselves included, to remember that the the the measurement is not the goal, what's the line when the measurement becomes the target? It ceases to be good measurement, right that like, if if, like the things that have worked well, to get my sweet students to Carleton have worked well for a time. But but that's not like the only tools that are available, right? And that thinking hard about stuff is an important part of education. And it's just one that is, yeah, it's hard to quantify. Jonathan Peelle 25:40 I think, you know, you kind of mentioned this earlier, but I think a big one is, you know, this idea of, well, for example, people who are in an undergraduate program might be thinking about graduate school, and thinking about, Oh, that's going to be competitive. And so there is I think there is often a sense of, you have to tick a bunch of boxes to, you know, to be competitive with the other people who are ticking the boxes, like an arms race, right, like if that other student is president of four things and also plays an instrument and also volunteered in a lab than I should probably do that too. And I think so I think how do you you know, fighting that is, is pretty challenging, I think you can and, you know, the argument would be that, that there are other benefits you get from slowing down and thinking deeply that actually will come through when you apply for things. I mean, first of all, obviously, it might still be the right thing to do, even if you're quote unquote, less competitive. But I think it's an easier kind of sell to people, if you sort of say, well, actually, you probably will be as competitive or more competitive, but it's going to show up in different ways. Gonna show up because going to be a more thoughtful essay writer, and you're going to be, you know, your other opportunities are going to open up that wouldn't if you're just spread too thin. Julia Strand 26:53 Yeah. And if you're only taking two classes, you're gonna have more opportunities to like, go to office hours and deeply impress your future letter writers with how hard you've been thinking about this stuff, too. And also that like, I mean, I know that you're applying to grad school, you're thinking about how to be the most competitive and all of that, but also helping to communicate to our trainees, that there is like, really no point in life, where you're ever like, now I am done, I have achieved everything that I want. And I don't have to think about what comes next. Right? I think we all have this mentality of like, once I get into grad school, then everything's gonna be okay, once I get my postdoc that everything's gonna be okay, once I get a faculty job once I get tenure, or whatever, but like, there's never a point where you're like, awesome, I'm done striving now, right? And so realizing that you just need to, like come to terms with the fact that there's always more you could do, but to maintain a quality of life. You also need to not always try to do one more thing, Jonathan Peelle 27:53 right? It's kind of a, like a double standard, quote, a double edged sword, a two pronged attack, I don't know two parts to it. Like, on the one hand, you can't put off life for some future date, because your life is now and like, well, first of all, it's a good philosophy generally. And also, like, in most careers, stuff never gets easier. So like, the clouds will never open, and all of a sudden, you can relax. It's just like, this is kind of how it's gonna be. So you have to make the most of it. I forgot my second part of that oath, but it was just related to just like, yeah, just accepting, accepting. That's how, how think, oh, accepting, that's how it's gonna be. But then also, you know, the time to start developing strategies around this, to have a happy life in the midst of lots of stuff pulling on your attention. Again, you don't magically, it's like, oh, I got tenure. Now I have strategies for dealing with too much stuff. Nope. If you didn't build them when you're younger, you're not going to get them when you're older. So, you know, we should all start today to get a little better at it. Because it's I don't think it's easy for for most people. Julia Strand 28:57 Yeah. Yeah. So, I mean, so like, these are conversations that I have, like, one on one with my students, you know, and when they are feeling particularly frazzled, and over extended, I try not to chastise them for doing too many things. But I will use that as an opportunity to be like, what what's next term gonna look like? And what do you think are the you know, the levers that you have to help yourself feel better about this stuff next term? Because that's also a way of you know, sometimes you're in a position where you're overextended and you didn't realize you would be, you know, the, the class is much harder than you anticipated and things like that. And so I think it's useful for thinking about, you know, how this affects what we what we choose to do next. Rather than beating yourself up for how it's how it's going right now. Jonathan Peelle 29:50 I think I like that. One thing I've tried. I haven't done this in a while, but for a couple of years there I was trying to at least once a year kind of check in with myself, and ahead, one of the questions I would ask myself was, you know, what would you like to be doing more of in your life? And what would you like to be doing less of? And it could be that some of those things, oh, I'd like to be doing less expense reports or something. But then, you know, maybe there's nothing, maybe there's no way around that, but at least I've put it out there. But but maybe there is maybe I can say, well, do I have someone in my lab who can help with an expense report or you don't I mean, like not to, not to be truthful about this. But I think just feeling like I have to do. And using that language, I have to do X, Y, and Z. There's a lot of assumptions that go into what each of us have to do. And I think, you know, even just changing it to like, I'm choosing to do XY and Z. Or I have to do X, but I'm choosing to do y and z, then it puts a little bit more of the responsibility on us instead of just like, oh, life, life is hard life is making me do all this stuff. Julia Strand 30:57 Yeah, yeah. Yeah. I mean, especially for those of us who are lucky enough to mostly be in charge of what we use our time for, you know, in deciding what we say yes to you, and what we say no to. Um, yeah, I think being mindful that those are actually choices. And even if something feels like, Oh, it's too good an opportunity, I can't possibly say no, we still, we still can in many in many cases. Another thing with with trainees is if somebody quits something that I am in charge of, I give them a lot of praise and reinforcement for choosing to do fewer things, rather than trying to overextend themselves and do too many things. And sometimes, that's a really bummer. Really a bummer. Like, it's a student that I really like, and I don't want them to leave my lab or you know, a student who's been a great contributor in class or just dropping the class, you know, it's often it's like, oh, man, this is makes things worse for me, I don't want you to quit. But still, even in those circumstances, being like, I hope this gives you the headspace to, you know, really enjoy the other things that you're doing and think about this more deeply. And, you know, so I think, I think, the way that we talk a bit about whether we talk to students who are leaving us for something, and the way that we talk about them, is also another way we can, you know, influence the culture. So if a student chooses to leave the lab, when I say and the next lab meeting, oh, so and so it's decided to step back from the lab. And I'm really proud of them for knowing, you know, we're choosing to allocate their time in such a way that they're not overextending themselves or something like that. Because then you know, that opens up the possibility that other people will want to leave your lab. No, that's, that's. That's what they need, right? Jonathan Peelle 32:49 Well, but you want them to consider it and know that that is a choice they can make. There might be pros and cons, as opposed to like, oh, that's off the table. Julia Strand 32:57 Yeah, I'm gonna get in so much trouble if I broach that, whatever. So that's the thing we can do. I don't know, all of these things feel so small compared to the big? Yeah, yeah. Jonathan Peelle 33:11 Why don't you think a big so I'm gonna make it about me for a minute. But, but like for, don't you think the social support for it really is being you know, as we've talked about before, kind of countercultural in a way. And so when you're trying to do that alone in your own head, that's really tough. And so, you know, Julie, I have you to help support me in this, even though you're not here, I know that I can rely on you to encourage me to say no to things and to use my time, wisely. But, you know, that's something I think we can also build in our classes in our labs, like, as you've been talking about, but I think, you know, kind of promoting that internal culture where that is valued, not just accepted, but sort of promoted is something we could do through stuff we talk about in lab meetings, or on podcasts and that kind of thing. Yep. Have you ever had I know you asked some of your students about like, what the reasons are for them feeling spread too thinly. But have you ever gotten anything back from that? Like, have you ever have you had like lab meetings to talk about this, like explicitly? Julia Strand 34:15 Um, yeah, ah, yes. Not Not often, what I have students in the summer, we always set aside a couple of lab meeting times where we talk about, about about things like this. Um, and, and I find it we end up talking, you know, at the start of every lab meeting, we just kind of run around the table and do check ins with people about how they're feeling. And if there's a day where a bunch of people are saying they're feeling stretched thin or over extended or too busy, you know, I'll I'll take a moment and be like, alright, what are the things like, how do we deal with this one of the approaches that you take to figure this stuff out, and how are you to do things differently? And so we do, we do talk about it some and I think my students and also when I tell them, I'm not Gotta you know, I got asked to do this thing, and it would have been so cool. And here's why I said no. You know, sometimes they'll also say, Oh, I also said no to a thing. And you know, and so we end up kind of talking about it that way. So it happens, but not typically, because I'm saying next Tuesday, we're talking about over commitment and how to avoid it. Jonathan Peelle 35:17 Please read this book ahead of time. And also, Julia Strand 35:20 yeah, usually comes up kind of more more organically. Jonathan Peelle 35:24 Over the years I've gone through, I haven't really been consistent about this, but I had this idea of having like, you know, some list of topics like five to 10 topics that I would go through every year, every other year, like, how do you make a CV? How do you make a scientific poster? How do you, you know, comment your code for, you know, to be the most helpful, I don't know, stuff that I want people in the lab to know. And that sometimes we'll talk about, but that in my mind, I'm like, Oh, we talked about that. But of course, I have new students every year. And so, you know, you have to kind of go through it again. But it's, you know, I've never been great about keeping track of it. But I could see this kind of topic kind of going in that rotation, right. So it's not just about research stuff, but there's some like time management, like, it's really like life philosophy, which I might not call it that in lead meaning but like, right, it's just how do you how do you manage this stuff? Julia Strand 36:19 Yeah. Yeah. I mean, that's, you know, another way to be deliberate and make it clear that it's important. Because I think this is this is also something that can really like, if you will impostor syndrome things too, right? Where, like, you look around and see, I see other people doing a lot of stuff, why is it hard for me to do a lot of stuff. And if you don't talk about the fact that it's hard for everybody, then I also kind of worry, though, about trying to like self care people out of structural problems, right, like, if the problem is actually the faculty have unrealistic expectations about how much work students can reasonably do in a given week, then, you know, saying to the students, you need to be more mindful of your time, or try to do things more efficiently or quit the Quidditch team or whatever, when the actual problem is that like, faculty have unrealistic expectations. And we need to have a talk with faculty about how to dial back, you know, the amount of work we assign or something like that. Jonathan Peelle 37:14 Right, right. Um, Julia Strand 37:16 I do often check in with my students about like, how long did the reading take you? Or, you know, for the the assignments that are done online, I can like, see how long it takes them to do them? And I use those to like, try and calibrate? Am I assigning a reasonable amount of work in my classes, because, you know, that's, that's something that I do have a lot of ability to control. So maybe also checking in to see if you're part of the problem in terms of how much work you assign. I will, I will often ask students, like, compared to other classes at Carleton is the amount of time that you spend studying for and doing the assignments for this class, similar to more than less than, you know, to also, like, get a handle. And that doesn't help if the problem is that everyone assigns too much work. And they're like, it's about the same in that it's too much. But I, you know, I am I am delighted to get course evaluations that say things like, I learned so much in this class. And it didn't stress me out more like I learned so much of this class, but I felt like the workload was reasonable. Because I think that, you know, just assigning more work, is a very easy way to make your class seem harder without actually making it any more like intellectually rigorous or meaningful. Right. And so, if I can find a 10 page reading, that nicely talks about the things that I think are important, I would much rather assign that than a 40 page reading that talks about that it just has a bunch of filler stuff in it, right? Because I would rather have you know, focused, deliberate, read readings that are reasonable. So they actually do them, you know, rather than big, sprawling things that people just halfway skim. Jonathan Peelle 39:03 Right? Well, you know, I guess, another way to frame that is sort of trying to have your assignments also go along with what you want people to do, which is maybe take a little bit more time be a little bit more in depth, but giving them the time to do that, right. So if it's a relatively shortest short reading, they could actually read the whole thing and think about it, which is what you want people to do generally more. Julia Strand 39:26 Right? Yeah, right. Another time I find opportunities to talk with students about this is in like academic advising. So when they, you know, come in to say I'm thinking about taking these classes next term. What do you think? And one of the one of the topics that I'm really interested in in the last couple of years, is that students often really have this drive to not just major in something but maybe majoring two things or do a major in two minors or two majors and a minor and, and this Sometimes when I talk with students about it, there are really good and compelling reasons to want to do that. But I think a lot of the time people say, Well, it just seems like having a major isn't enough. And I like I could do this minor too. So I guess I'll do that as well. And often, what that looks like to me is, that means, you know, you have to take these six classes you haven't taken yet, in order to get the minor and oftentimes, they're only actually interested in in three of them. But they recognize that they just take the other three classes, then they get the minor and you know, when they have a minor, and that seems to me, like such an unfortunate situation, because if they take the three classes that they're interested in, and then take three other classes that they're interested in, they still can say, you know, to future employers, or whatever. Look, I have demonstrated that I have an interest in this thing, because I took three classes in it. And here's why I thought they were interesting, whatever. But without the like having to take these other classes that they're not actually interested in, you know, in order to have an additional like, line on their, on their CV. And from the folks that I've talked with about this, and actually, Jonathan, I would love to get your input on this. Like, if you are looking at potential PhD candidates. So you're like looking at the transcripts of you know, all these great undergrads is somebody who, let's say, you've got two candidates, they both majored in psychology, one of them also minored, in statistics, and the other one didn't minor in anything, but took five classes in statistics, does the fact that they have minored in it, rather than that they have taken classes in it like does that do anything for you? Jonathan Peelle 41:44 No. I mean, maybe some people it does, but but not for me. Julia Strand 41:48 So everybody that I have talked to that isn't charged that like actually admits grad students like no, like, you look at the research experience, you look at the classes that they've taken. But if somebody says in a cover letter, I'm also really interested in stats, and I've taken five classes and stats, that's not any different than I minored in stats, right, because like, Who even knows what a minor means at different schools. And so I feel like, that seems like a really clear case of tallying up of like counting the things that we can count. And having that be the goal, rather than having the kind of educational experience you want to have. Um, so I talk with advisees a lot about this to have, you know, who are you doing this for? And if you're doing the minor, because you think it's gonna get you into a graduate program? Don't do it for that reason? Because it probably won't. And you'll end up having a less fulfilling educational experience that if you just took the things, you know, that you want to do. I mean, okay, I'm content to hard on minors. What is nice about a minor is that it might be there are three classes that you think sound particularly appealing. And another three that you don't think are appealing, but are important in order to have a nuanced understanding of the discipline. And the faculty have thought, you know, had been mindful about structuring that experience. So maybe you would get something out of it. But I don't know. Jonathan Peelle 43:10 You're not saying don't mind it, you're saying to think about your your goals and your reasons for doing it? And and also what you're giving up by saying yes to that, right. So like, giving up? Yeah. Which is different, I think, you know, one of the, I don't know, okay, I'm not an expert on like, behavior modification, or, you know, or friendlier term for it. But I feel like a useful place to start to sort of thinking about what are you know, yeah, start with like, one, what is your goal, right, instead of starting with, here's all this stuff I have to do. Because I'm assuming that I'm gonna have a certain goal, but like, think about it, not just one goal, multiple goals, like, I'd like to go to graduate school, but also like to, you know, try to take care of my health. And I'd also like to, like have a social life. Like, those are three different goals and different choices, support them, support those differently, right. And so then if you kind of start with like, what do I want my life to look like? And then you have to kind of make it fit a little bit as opposed to saying yes to everything and hoping for the best. Right, right. Yeah. Giulio, sometimes on this podcast, we have little challenges for each other, or for our listeners, and then sometimes you forget to check in about it later, which which is okay, but anyway, are there any, any challenges that you think we could propose for each other or for other people kind of related to this? Julia Strand 44:31 Well, I would love to hear our listeners suggestions about things that we can do to avoid perpetuating a culture of overextending of overextension in our trainees. So, if there are things as you've been listening to this, you've been like, Oh, one thing I did do, or one thing my PA did or whatever, I would love to hear those. So your challenge is to email us and tell us what you think about this. And if you want, leave your mailing address and I will send you a sticker And I see that I'm behind on sending stickers. I just looked at our email. I'm gonna I'm gonna send out some stickers. Awesome. My challenge for you, Jonathan, Jonathan Peelle 45:11 I thought I was gonna get off on that one. I was like, Okay, I don't have to do anything great. Okay, Julia Strand 45:15 notice something that you want to say yes to. It something you know that seventh on the list? Um, no. Ah, what's my challenge to you? I want to say to have a beer with me, but you're Jonathan Peelle 45:32 okay, we'll have to we'll have to plan. Yeah, oh I'll owe you one, how about that. Julia Strand 45:36 Here we go. All right, everybody. Well, thanks so much for listening. Nice to be back with you. And hopefully we are next time you just won't be quite so long. Jonathan Peelle 45:46 At least by the end of the year, I think for that. Julia Strand 45:49 Alright, talk to you next time. Jonathan Peelle 45:51 All right. Bye, everybody. Transcribed by https://otter.ai