Thoughts on dissertation as of January, 2023
time to write a dissertation proposal!
Entering the third year of my PhD, I went through many! Lots of stress for sure, but also many growth in myself.
The most important thing (perhaps) I learned is nothing is easy. I was expecting things to be easy and fast when I first started. Looking back, it was nice to have the ambition and passion dominated by naivety, but I might have fewer frustrating moments when trying to reach (unrealistic) goals had I known this. It was not just about acquiring new knowledge, it was about almost everything, such as formulating a novel and nice research idea, turning it into a plan, continuously working towards analysis (debugging) and publications (R&R for endless versions), finding and keeping a work-life balance, and being healthy mentally and physically. There might be nothing wrong with the goals themselves, but about the time frame I set and an emphaiss on results instead of the process. Being aware that things don't come easy makes me more patient and focused on my own work and life, instead of rushing to achieve things and feeling very bad when there're no immediate rewards. One sign of change is that I used to think about completing my PhD as fast as possible, now I really don't mind having a fifth year (esp. as I really like ASU SGSUP). Anyways, keeping a good mentality is critically important to pursuing a PhD, and perhaps also to anything, which I know now.
Last year, I passed my comprehensive exam, and officially became a PhD candidate candidate. One more thing until All But Dissertation -- a dissertation proposal. On one hand, it is quite exciting to start working on my dissertation, because it means I will actually have 'my work', something I (hope) can be proud of. On the other hand, how do I come up with a nice research question and plan? How to balance what I am interested in, what is valued by academia and the society, and many other factors? Every time I ask myself 'what am I interested in', my brain always go blank for a second. Then I realize it is not about what I care about the most at the moment, but 'what do I want to do for research for which my passion can persist at least until I graduate'. Then it becomes easier to answer! For example, an astronomer could also be interested in social inequity issues but it does not necessarily affect their choice on research topics unless they decide to switch fields. Although things can get more confusing for geographers because our field is so interdisciplinary and encompassing, I can and have been having a firm answer to at least the general field -- landscape ecology and conservation. I have documents such as research statements recording what I envision myself to do throughout the past two years. Now, I can build upon them to formulate my dissertation proposal.
For my dissertation, I hope to study (for now): applying GIS and RS to assist in ahieving Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework goals. Specifically, I want to produce data products/develop methods to help measure goal(s). Then, I will be exploring how bottom-up approach work with such a global scale initiative and evalute our current science in hopes of helping effective implementation. Regarding the specific problem I want to probe into, I still need some work to do to finalize. However, although I have many times doubted myself or felt incompetent, I am quite happy and confident about this direction now. I do hope I will be proud of my dissertation when I graduate!