Today I’m sharing the story of “Fatima”—a composite of so many scholars I’ve worked with over the years (and, honestly, a little bit of me too). Her dissertation sprint “worked.” She finished, defended, and landed a faculty job. But once she stepped into life as a new professor, the same strategies that got her across the finish line suddenly stopped working altogether.

I use her story to explore a tension I see all the time: the difference between being productive in the short term and building a writing practice you can actually sustain over a long academic career. I don’t get into step-by-step systems or productivity hacks here. You can find those any place you look these days. Instead, I invite you to reflect on how your current approach to writing is shaping not just your output, but also your energy, your health, and your relationship to your work.

If you’ve ever felt like the only way to make progress is to push harder, longer, and past your own limits, this episode is a gentle pause. A chance to ask a different question: what would it look like to write in a way that supports your life, instead of slowly consuming it?

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