I Keep Getting Distracted: When “Rabbit Holes” Aren’t Just a Discipline Problem

You sit down to work on Chapter 3.

The section you really don’t want to look at has been waiting for you all week. You know it needs tightening. You’ve even written in the margin, “Clarify epistemological positioning here.”

You open the document. You reread the last paragraph. You highlight a sentence that needs strengthening — and then you open a new tab to check one citation.

Twenty minutes later, you’re three articles deep into something adjacent to your project. Interesting. Possibly relevant. Not what you meant to be doing.

By the time you return to your draft, the original thread feels thinner. You’ve lost the shape of it. The sentence you meant to strengthen now looks stranger than before.

I keep falling down rabbit holes.

This is usually the point where people assume they lack discipline.

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What it looks like

You start the day with clear intentions:

• Revise Section 3.

• Draft the transition into Chapter 4.

• Respond to your supervisor’s comment about strengthening the conceptual framing.

But the work keeps expanding sideways.

A footnote leads to another paper. That paper opens up a theoretical wrinkle. That wrinkle exposes a weakness in your framing. Now you’re not revising — you’re re-reading. Not drafting — but checking.

By mid-afternoon, you’ve consumed far more than you’ve produced. Your browser is full of tabs. Your notes app has three new fragments. The chapter itself has changed very little.

You close the laptop feeling vaguely busy, but not finished. Not satisfied. Not entirely sure what you did.

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What we’re trained to assume

Distraction is moralised.

If you were more focused, you’d stick to the task. If you had better time management, you wouldn’t stray. If you were truly committed, you wouldn’t need to check “just one more thing”.

Academic culture quietly equates narrow focus with seriousness. The image of the disciplined scholar — deep in one text, undisturbed — still holds a certain power.

So rabbit holes become evidence of weakness.

You translate a structural phenomenon into a character flaw.

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What’s actually happening

There are two kinds of rabbit hole.

The first is avoidance.

You already know what needs writing — perhaps the paragraph that positions your work against a key critic — and you’re using reading as a buffer. It feels productive. It postpones exposure. It delays committing words to the page.

Avoidance often disguises itself as refinement.

The second is structural exploration.

You’ve hit a genuine gap. A citation that doesn’t quite support the claim. A concept that needs sharpening. A definitional ambiguity that will ripple through the rest of the chapter if left unresolved.

The sideways movement isn’t drift. It’s the project revealing where it’s thin.

From the outside, both look identical.

Internally, they feel different.

Avoidance carries a subtle reluctance to return to the draft.
Exploration carries a sense that something important is being clarified.

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Why doctoral work amplifies this

Doctoral projects are unusually porous.

They are long enough to expand indefinitely. Complex enough to justify further reading almost anywhere. High-stakes enough to make committing words feel risky.

There’s always one more article you could check. One more theorist you could incorporate. One more counterargument you could anticipate.

The project doesn’t come with built-in boundaries, so attention management isn’t just about discipline. It’s about discernment inside an inherently open system.

That’s harder than we admit.

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How to tell which one you’re in

Instead of asking, “Why can’t I focus?”, try:

• If I closed every tab right now, would I know what sentence needs writing next?

• Am I reading to avoid drafting — or to resolve a real gap?

• Does this detour clarify the argument, or merely delay it?

If you don’t know what to write next, the rabbit hole may be avoidance.

If you do know — but the argument genuinely needs reinforcement — the detour may be structural.

Not all sideways movement is wasted.

But unbounded sideways movement is costly.

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A steadier stance

Deep projects aren’t linear.

They expand and contract. They expose weaknesses and demand reinforcement. They move in spirals more than straight lines.

What matters isn’t eliminating every rabbit hole. It’s recognising when you’re circling to avoid contact — and when you’re circling because the work is asking to be strengthened. That distinction is far more useful than calling yourself distracted.

You don’t need perfect focus.

You need to stay in contact with the next necessary sentence.

Until next time,
stay with what matters

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March Dates for Your Diary

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Reverse Outlining (asynchronous workshop)

Recording available to paid subscribers from Wednesday 11 March

30 minutes to learn the method, followed by a simple, guided process to walk through a piece of your own writing.

Reverse outlining is one of the clearest ways to see what your draft is actually doing — not what you intended it to do.

If you’ve been thinking, I don’t know if this is good or awful, this is a calm, structural way to find out.

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Coffee & Chat (for paid subscribers)

Tuesday 17 March, 4:00–5:00pm GMT | Check your local time

Thursday 26 March, 10:00–11:00am GMT | Check your local time

Two time slots, to try and catch different time zones.

These are informal, grounded conversations — an opportunity to explore some of this month’s themes in relation to your own context.

If you’ve been thinking:

I should be further along.
I don’t know if this is any good.
Why can’t I just decide?

— this is a space to unpack that, calmly, in company.

You’re welcome to bring something specific, or simply for a general chat.
No preparation required.

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Online Writing Retreat (open to all)

Thursday 19 March, 9:00am–4:30pm GMT | Check your local time

A full day of structured, live writing — particularly helpful if your attention has been fragmenting, your draft feels unstable, or the work keeps expanding sideways.

Not a sprint.
Not a productivity performance.

Just steady, sustained contact with your own argument, in company — long enough to move beyond the first layer of distraction and into something more settled.

Tickets available here.
For a £10 ticket (50% discount), use code TSLSPRING at checkout. Thanks for being here.

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Quiet Quarter Turn (asynchronous workshop)

Recording available to paid subscribers from Wednesday 25 March.

An hour to map the coming three months — April to June — before the next stretch gathers pace.

Not detailed planning.
Not optimisation.

A structured pause to ask:

• What phase am I actually entering?

• What needs consolidating before summer?

• What would make the next quarter feel coherent rather than reactive?

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Prepare Well for April (live and asynchronous options)

Monthly 1-hour planning session (for paid subscribers)
Friday 27 March, 1:00–2:00pm GMT | Check your local time

If you can’t join us live, I’ll be sharing a recording by the end of the day, so you can work through it in your own time.

A gentle, one-hour session to help you:

• decide what matters heading into April

• let go of what doesn’t

• choose a pace that feels liveable

Less about optimisation.
More about orientation.

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