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Isolation
Barbara Sher, author of Wishcraft and Live the Life You Love says, "Isolation is the dream killer." It is also the destroyer of dissertation writers. Writing any thing can be a lonely task, having trouble writing something can be an even lonelier and more self destructive endeavor. People need to interact with other people in order to be creative, they also need to interact in order to see solutions to problems. However, the dissertation writer often becomes isolated first with the intention of working and then from the shame of not working. Believing he in the importance of doing the work independently, failing to recognize that this is a project that requires help and input, students do isolate themselves.
Henry Rosovsky, former dean at Harvard, entitles a section of his book The University : "Fight isolation: it is the greatest enemy of graduate students." In this section, he urges graduate students to form small groups to study and socialize (p. 154). Some students need help knowing how to go about forming such groups and realizing that they can be formed with students from different departments. See the section on Peer support.
Peer Support
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