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How to be a psychologically safe supervisor
Over the past year I have been very fortunate to work with an outstanding team at the University of Stirling, who brought me in to help develop a mental health aware coaching programme for their research postgraduates. As part of this programme I have the opportunity to offer some training to PhD supervisors about mental…
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Finding a definition of workplace trauma
This is an extended version of a short piece I recently posted on Substack. If you would like to connect with my writing more frequently Substack is the place to do it. You can subscribe free and receive my shorter pieces into your inbox every weekday. I had an interesting conversation with a fellow coach recently. She…
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A gentle (re)turn to journaling
Thank you for reading. If you are enjoying this blog, please subscribe, and consider supporting me to keep producing free content using this link. I used to be a dedicated journaller. At one point in my academic career it was the only writing I was doing. I used journaling to get through the pandemic. I spent entire train journeys…
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On Writing
I have been writing every day for November over on substack, in an online research diary. The daily substacks give little insights into my thought processes around the writing part of my life, ranging from notes on a research idea to my frustration at a disrupted evening when I had planned to write (this blog…
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On saying ‘no’
At a recent somatic class with Rebekah Ballagh (Journey to Wellness), Becks invited us to practice saying ‘no’. This invitation came as the culmination of a series of gentle practices aimed at opening up our throats and releasing stuck tension from neck, chest, and jaw. Somatic practices, like those developed by Pay Ogden and Peter…
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Starting a PhD with Wellness in Mind
If you are a regular reader and would like to support me to produce more free content, do consider buying me a coffee via my supporters page. Thank you for reading. It’s that time of year when research postgraduates tend to start their programmes, or to be transitioning from their first year reviews. So in…
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Burnout prevention is an act of resistance
Recently I had the pleasure of working with a small group of academics, all at different stages in their career journey, through the Summer Coaching Programme. Over three months we explored how burnout happens, what recovery and repair look like, and in our final session last week, how we can resource ourselves against burning out…
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Workplace trauma and the ‘second violence’
In this post I am going to explore workplace trauma, and the effect that not having our stories heard can have. Trauma is a common word these days, in part due to the efforts of online psychoeducators to destigmatise normal mental health challenges from public and private shame. But the overuse of trauma as a…
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Understanding Imposter Syndrome
We all know it, we’ve all felt it. Academics talk flippantly of imposter syndrome, and it seems to be a generally accepted aspect of working in the sector. This phenomenon is also true of the cultural and creative sectors, with whom academics have more in common than they might generally accept. Any time we put…
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