when you feel that your work is becoming stressful, even feel it is becoming tedious, how do you keep motivated,

Question: when you feel that your work is becoming stressful, even feel it is becoming tedious, how do you keep motivated, inspire yourself to strive further in your field? :)

Asked by turnak1 to Anne, Carolyn, Joe, Mariana, Nick on 16 Mar 2010 in Categories: About.
- Joseph Devlin answered on 16 Mar 2010:
  
  That’s an excellent question because both things happen fairly regularly (and no doubt happen in any job). For me, there are a couple of things that keep me going. First, having students working with me means that I have things I need to do for them in order to support them properly and those are easy to motivate. In addition, I always have many projects going at once so if one becomes excessively tedious, I can focus my energies elsewhere for a bit and do something I enjoy more, giving myself a little time to recoup.
  
  One of the great things about being a scientist is that each day is different and there are so many things going on all the time, that there is endless variety and opportunity to keep you interested.
- Nick Bradshaw answered on 16 Mar 2010:
  
  I try to remember why I am studying it and, if necessary, switch to doing something else for a while. Science is quite a good job in that there are often a lot of things that you could do (different experiments, writing up papers, reading up on what others have been doing) and you have quite a lot of choice as to which you do at any one time.
- Carolyn McGettigan answered on 16 Mar 2010:
  
  There are always boring chores that have to be done. I think the advantage of a research job is that I usually have several projects ‘on the go’ at once. So, if I am bored writing a paper for one study I can turn to the analysis for another, or do some work preparing the materials for the next experiment.
  
  There are definitely times when I worry about whether I am doing well / working hard enough, and it can be a bit depressing. The timescale along which things happen in science is much slower than in other jobs, and the big rewards (e.g. getting a paper accepted for publication) don’t come every week. I think it’s important to have good support and encouragement from other people at work and at home – I’m lucky to have both and usually I find that I’m pretty quickly feeling much more positive again!
- Mariana Vargas answered on 16 Mar 2010:
  
  Great question! Well, it is useful to keep thinking about the “big picture”, the original question of the research project.
  For example when one experiment goes wrong, to see if there are other ways of doing it, to ask for help to someone with expertise in the area I am struggling with, to double check if an experiment that is not working and taking months is really necessary to answer the research question. It helps to discuss with colleages and with my boss when I am having some trouble, to see whether I have really considered all my options.
  And of course… a holiday in the sun always helps 🙂 when you come back full of energy and with a tan everything seems much easier.
- Anne Seawright answered on 18 Mar 2010:
  
  I think all jobs at the end of the day have periods when they can be stressful or tedious and I find that trying to focus on areas that I do really enjoy and that do inspire me help me get my motivation back to do the less exciting bits. Either that or I have a big bar of chocolate!

Question: when you feel that your work is becoming stressful, even feel it is becoming tedious, how do you keep motivated, inspire yourself to strive further in your field? :)

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