The Centre for Learning and Teaching (CLT) organised a webinar titled “A Soul-ful Journey to A Goal-ful Destination: Overcoming Trips and Hurdles” on 21 September 2022 via Microsoft Teams. The webinar was moderated by Faculty of Arts and Social Science academic Geetha Veerappan.

The talk was delivered by Faculty of Creative Industries academic Dr Saraswathy Thurairaj. Dr Saraswathy has worked at UTAR for 15 years and she has won a total of 50 awards in teaching, research and public speaking. As of now, Dr Saraswathy has been teaching for 23 years.

The webinar aimed to inspire others to become competent researchers who can conduct independent research in their chosen area, increase the motivation of postgraduate students, and share tips for enduring postgraduate studies.

Quoting Helen Keller, Dr Saraswathy said, “Optimism is the faith that leads to achievement. Nothing can be done without hope and confidence”. She stated, “This is truly the inner reflection of myself. I’ve always been a person who can overcome anything if I have confidence. One of the characteristics to be successful is confidence. Confidence is the key to everything.”

Dr Saraswathy then moved on to highlight the importance of understanding the significance of a study and how it could contribute to the society. “One of the toughest components while doing the PhD is to understand the problem statement. A problem statement is a guiding star for your creative thinking. It addresses the 5Ws, namely who; where; what; why and when. A problem statement is one sentence that sums up what you want to change. Besides, it helps you to find more useful solutions by providing a clear and inspiring aim. You may use a certain approach to understand why it is important to make a problem statement at the beginning of a creative problem-solving process,” she explained.

According to Dr Saraswathy, one of the major challenges in completing assignments and theses is procrastination. So, she highlighted ten ways to effectively overcome procrastination, which included believing in one’s ability to succeed; to setting up several concrete deadlines; to eliminating distractions from the study environment; breaking large tasks into small and medium actionable pieces; rewarding oneself for every accomplishment; marking streaks of days on which one completes the tasks; avoiding a perfectionist mindset and implementing plans; visualising and focusing on the end goal instead of the task; figuring out how and why one procrastinates and counting to ten before indulging the impulse to procrastinate. Dr Saraswathy also displayed the four infographics taken from Stephen R.Covey’s book titled, The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People.

Dr Saraswathy finally said, “PhD/FYP journey is different for every individual. Do not compare yourself with another. No one can understand your tears, hardships, commitments and life journey. Instead, think about your study duration and think about how much you want to accomplish in your study journey. Do not worry too much and keep fighting; your time will come and your hard work will pay off.” Moreover, Dr Saraswathy's quote in 1993 which has been her life principle is "If you want to be what you want to be, believe in what you want to be and you will be, what you want to be.”

The insightful talk ended with Q&A and group photography sessions.