{"id":2659,"date":"2023-03-09T18:30:49","date_gmt":"2023-03-09T09:30:49","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/derrylab.com\/?p=2659"},"modified":"2023-04-25T22:44:06","modified_gmt":"2023-04-25T13:44:06","slug":"why-is-it-so-hard-to-start-working-on-our-own-dissertation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.derrylab.com\/index.php\/2023\/03\/09\/why-is-it-so-hard-to-start-working-on-our-own-dissertation\/","title":{"rendered":"Why is it So Hard to Start Working on Our Own Dissertation"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><p>Today I felt so overwhelmed. Too many tasks have to be done here and there, constantly consuming my energy to work on my dissertation. I don&#8217;t quite understand what happens.<\/p>\n<p>So I asked ChatGPT exactly using this post title, and it responded with good pieces of advice. \ud83d\ude42<\/p>\n<h2>Why?<\/h2>\n<p>Starting to work on a dissertation can be difficult for several reasons:<\/p>\n<p>Overwhelming scope: Dissertations are typically long, complex, and require a substantial amount of research and writing. The sheer scope of the project can be overwhelming and daunting, making it difficult to know where to start.<br><br>Lack of structure: Unlike other academic assignments, a dissertation does not come with a set structure or clear instructions. This lack of structure can make it difficult to know how to approach the project and where to begin.<br><br>Perfectionism: Many people feel a lot of pressure to produce a perfect dissertation, which can be paralyzing. This pressure can cause people to procrastinate or avoid starting altogether.<br><br>Fear of failure: A dissertation is a significant academic achievement, and the fear of failure can be a strong motivator for avoiding starting the project.<br><br>Lack of motivation: Writing a dissertation can be a long and lonely process, and it can be challenging to maintain motivation over an extended period. This lack of motivation can make it difficult to start the project.<br><br>To overcome these challenges, it can be helpful to break the dissertation down into smaller, more manageable tasks, set clear goals and deadlines, and seek support from advisors, peers, or mentors. It is also essential to recognize that a dissertation does not need to be perfect, and it is normal to make mistakes and revise the work as you go.<\/p>\n<h2>Solution<\/h2>\n<p>Breaking down the dissertation into smaller, more manageable tasks and setting clear goals and deadlines can make the project feel less overwhelming and help you make progress towards completing it. Here are some tips for breaking down your dissertation:<br><br>Start with an outline: Create an outline of your dissertation that includes all of the chapters and sections that you need to write. This will help you see the big picture and identify the smaller tasks that need to be completed.<br><br>Break it down by chapter: Once you have an outline, break each chapter down into smaller sections or subtopics. For example, for a literature review chapter, you might break it down into sections on the background of the research, previous studies, and the research gap.<br><br>Set deadlines for each task: Once you have identified the smaller tasks, set deadlines for each one. This will help you stay on track and avoid procrastination.<br><br>Prioritize tasks: Identify the tasks that are most important or urgent and prioritize them accordingly. This will help you make progress on the most critical tasks first.<br><br>Celebrate progress: When you complete a task, take a moment to celebrate your progress. This will help you stay motivated and feel good about the work you are doing.<br><br>Remember, a dissertation is a long-term project, and it is normal to encounter obstacles along the way. Be patient with yourself, take breaks when you need to, and keep moving forward one small task at a time.<\/p>\n<p>I hope this insight could help you understand the root cause of this problem if you are in the same situation as me. \ud83d\ude42<\/p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Today I felt so overwhelmed. Too many tasks have to be done here and there, constantly consuming my energy to work on my dissertation. I don&#8217;t quite understand what happens. So I asked ChatGPT exactly using this post title, and it responded with good pieces of advice. \ud83d\ude42 Why? Starting to work on a dissertation [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2808,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[118],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2659","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-understanding"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.derrylab.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/03\/pexels-photo-220237.jpeg?fit=1828%2C1300&ssl=1","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":591,"url":"https:\/\/blog.derrylab.com\/index.php\/2022\/03\/18\/now-i-understand-what-is-oblivious-ram\/","url_meta":{"origin":2659,"position":0},"title":"Now I Understand: What is Oblivious RAM?","author":"derry","date":"March 18, 2022","format":false,"excerpt":"ORAM is the acronym of an Oblivious Random-Access Machine. The main idea is to hide the access patterns from attackers. For example, when a client tries to access data stored in the server, the server cannot gain any information about the user access pattern. Imagine data storage, where each data\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;Programming&quot;","block_context":{"text":"Programming","link":"https:\/\/blog.derrylab.com\/index.php\/category\/programming\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.derrylab.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/03\/harrison-broadbent-ING1Uf1Fc30-unsplash-1.jpg?fit=1200%2C675&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.derrylab.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/03\/harrison-broadbent-ING1Uf1Fc30-unsplash-1.jpg?fit=1200%2C675&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.derrylab.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/03\/harrison-broadbent-ING1Uf1Fc30-unsplash-1.jpg?fit=1200%2C675&ssl=1&resize=525%2C300 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.derrylab.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/03\/harrison-broadbent-ING1Uf1Fc30-unsplash-1.jpg?fit=1200%2C675&ssl=1&resize=700%2C400 2x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.derrylab.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/03\/harrison-broadbent-ING1Uf1Fc30-unsplash-1.jpg?fit=1200%2C675&ssl=1&resize=1050%2C600 3x"},"classes":[]},{"id":235,"url":"https:\/\/blog.derrylab.com\/index.php\/2021\/06\/24\/this-makes-my-risc-v-trap-handler-does-not-work\/","url_meta":{"origin":2659,"position":1},"title":"This Makes My RISC-V Trap Handler Does Not Work","author":"derry","date":"June 24, 2021","format":false,"excerpt":"I was working on a RISCV assembly when suddenly I got a weird issue.The exception does not get caught in the trap handler. I thought this was a QEMU bug on the RISCV target because the trap handler works on my other code.Then after a day of digging, I figured\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;Programming&quot;","block_context":{"text":"Programming","link":"https:\/\/blog.derrylab.com\/index.php\/category\/programming\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":5208,"url":"https:\/\/blog.derrylab.com\/index.php\/2025\/12\/31\/how-to-recruit-great-talents-efficiently-with-ai-powered-recruitment-engine\/","url_meta":{"origin":2659,"position":2},"title":"How to Recruit Great Talents Efficiently with AI Powered Recruitment Engine","author":"derry","date":"December 31, 2025","format":false,"excerpt":"I built\u00a0Talens\u00a0because I was tired of how broken hiring feels when you are on the side that actually has to build and lead teams. Before working in industry, I was a\u00a0research lab team leader, responsible for selecting students and researchers who would stay with us for years. Later, as an\u00a0AI\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;Artificial Intelligence&quot;","block_context":{"text":"Artificial Intelligence","link":"https:\/\/blog.derrylab.com\/index.php\/category\/artificial-intelligence\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.derrylab.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/image-1.png?fit=1200%2C559&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.derrylab.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/image-1.png?fit=1200%2C559&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.derrylab.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/image-1.png?fit=1200%2C559&ssl=1&resize=525%2C300 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.derrylab.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/image-1.png?fit=1200%2C559&ssl=1&resize=700%2C400 2x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.derrylab.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/image-1.png?fit=1200%2C559&ssl=1&resize=1050%2C600 3x"},"classes":[]},{"id":4521,"url":"https:\/\/blog.derrylab.com\/index.php\/2025\/06\/17\/how-to-osv-vulnerabilities-api-scanners-and-a-bit-of-hope\/","url_meta":{"origin":2659,"position":3},"title":"How to OSV: Vulnerabilities API, Scanners, and a Bit of Hope","author":"derry","date":"June 17, 2025","format":false,"excerpt":"Security vulnerabilities in open-source dependencies are like background radiation, mostly ignorable, until they're not. Since we are currently working on vulnerability detection research, today, I decided to see how much trouble I could get into by poking around Google's Open Source Vulnerabilities database and its scanner. Spoiler: not much. But\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"code security tools\"","block_context":{"text":"code security tools","link":"https:\/\/blog.derrylab.com\/index.php\/tag\/code-security-tools\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"pexels-photo-96612.jpeg","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.derrylab.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/06\/pexels-photo-96612.jpeg?fit=1200%2C800&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.derrylab.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/06\/pexels-photo-96612.jpeg?fit=1200%2C800&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.derrylab.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/06\/pexels-photo-96612.jpeg?fit=1200%2C800&ssl=1&resize=525%2C300 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.derrylab.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/06\/pexels-photo-96612.jpeg?fit=1200%2C800&ssl=1&resize=700%2C400 2x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.derrylab.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/06\/pexels-photo-96612.jpeg?fit=1200%2C800&ssl=1&resize=1050%2C600 3x"},"classes":[]},{"id":4502,"url":"https:\/\/blog.derrylab.com\/index.php\/2025\/06\/09\/how-to-learn-sql-in-only-6-minutes\/","url_meta":{"origin":2659,"position":4},"title":"How to Learn SQL in Only 10 Minutes","author":"derry","date":"June 9, 2025","format":false,"excerpt":"I used to hate SQL.Too many keywords, weird syntax, and you always need some dummy table to even get started. But today, I finally sat down and said: \"Alright. Lets teach myself SQL like I have 10 minutes before a demo.\"So here's what I learned, I wish someone told me\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;linux&quot;","block_context":{"text":"linux","link":"https:\/\/blog.derrylab.com\/index.php\/category\/linux\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"books in black wooden book shelf","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.derrylab.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/06\/books-bookstore-book-reading-159711.jpeg?fit=1200%2C798&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.derrylab.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/06\/books-bookstore-book-reading-159711.jpeg?fit=1200%2C798&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.derrylab.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/06\/books-bookstore-book-reading-159711.jpeg?fit=1200%2C798&ssl=1&resize=525%2C300 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.derrylab.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/06\/books-bookstore-book-reading-159711.jpeg?fit=1200%2C798&ssl=1&resize=700%2C400 2x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.derrylab.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/06\/books-bookstore-book-reading-159711.jpeg?fit=1200%2C798&ssl=1&resize=1050%2C600 3x"},"classes":[]},{"id":146,"url":"https:\/\/blog.derrylab.com\/index.php\/2020\/12\/29\/arty-a7-riscv-debugging-using-j-link\/","url_meta":{"origin":2659,"position":5},"title":"Stuck at Debugging RISCV on Arty A7 using J-Link","author":"derry","date":"December 29, 2020","format":false,"excerpt":"Running the RISCV Processor I got an Arty A7 board coming to my desk, and I'm curious to try running a RISCV processor on it. Not long after following the tutorial from Digilent, I was able to program the RISCV processor on this board just by using a MicroUSB cable.\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;Programming&quot;","block_context":{"text":"Programming","link":"https:\/\/blog.derrylab.com\/index.php\/category\/programming\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.derrylab.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2659","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.derrylab.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.derrylab.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.derrylab.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.derrylab.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2659"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/blog.derrylab.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2659\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2809,"href":"https:\/\/blog.derrylab.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2659\/revisions\/2809"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.derrylab.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2808"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.derrylab.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2659"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.derrylab.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2659"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.derrylab.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2659"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}