Amerigo and Dissertations
March 9th is Amerigo Vespucci’s birthday. How do you get a whole new world named after you? To start off, you have to see it for what it is, you like your dissertation…
Popular culture credits Christopher Columbus with discovering the New World. Of course, the Vikings also “discovered” the New World some 500 years previous. And, there were already people there at the time, so…
But, Columbus was convinced that he had reached the East, that he had found a valuable trade route. It was Amerigo Vespucci, around 1500 A.D., that realized this land was not the Orient of Marco Polo’s reports, but rather a completely different land mass, a New World.
Vespucci may or may not have forged documents indicating that he had explored the area just prior to Columbus’s famous voyage. And, that may or may not have been the impetus for Martin Waldseemüller labeling the new continent, “America,” in his book, Cosmographie Introductio, of 1507.
But, a little gile and forgery notwithstanding, Vespucci was the first to recognize his eventual namesake for what it is…something new and completely different than what had been known before.
Successful dissertation students must similarly recognize the dissertation process as something new a different from what they have known before. Gone are the safety nets of instruction, assignments, assessments, and evaluation. The very hallmarks of academic life as you have known it to this point are largely gone.
But, as a modern doctoral student, as a mid-career professional who wants to multiply your professional opportunities rather than pursue a lifetime of research, you need to embrace a deeper realization. Your dissertation is not some romantic ode to academia and intellect. It’s not going to save the world. It’s not even going to change the world.
It’s irrelevant.
It can be painful to accept the fact that to which you have dedicated so much of your time, energy, passion, and finances is nothing more than a school project. But, when you do embrace this new understand of the world you’re exploring, it feels like you’re shrugging off the weight of the world.
Instead of erecting a monument that must withstand time eternal, you simply have to finish a project, to write a paper. The topic doesn’t really matter. The content doesn’t really matter. As long as you complete a project that meets you school’s guidelines and wins your committee’s approval, you graduate!
If you’re ready to treat the dissertation world for what it really is, click hereto schedule a quick, 15-minute chat with me to see if you’re a good fit for our Fast Track Your Dissertation Coaching Program. If you are, then I’ll invite you to join the fastest group of dissertation students out there and help you to reach graduation a good year or two faster than you would on your own.
