Arbitrary

Photo by Evelyn Mostrom
image courtesy of unsplash.com

I’ve started thinking about this research question, and how to go about figuring out going about beginning it (without doing any of it yet of course), and a few things have occurred to me.

First, I should maybe look into how to research -- this is surely a thing, everything is something in the age of the internet (there are too many people like me trying to make Something out of Almost Nothing by multiplying it times a URL code).  Maybe if I knew a little better about how proper research is conducted I might be able to think more clearly about getting started.

Second, I need topics to research -- I feel like I’m stumbling further down the endless tower of turtles on this one, first needing writing practice to be good at writing, then needing topics to write about, then needing research to fuel those topics, and now -- and preferably ones that will minimize enthusiasm drag.

Enthusiasm drag is an idea I just made up; I have a mental image of a project as being like an extremely (or maybe not) aerodynamic car, but one which has no engine.

They only way it gets forward momentum is from the big initial push of enthusiasm for the project -- you can drift a bit from minor successes, but you’re more or less waging a war against the constant weight and air resistance of eventually not giving a damn.

Third, I need a goal for what I’m planning on doing with the research -- for one thing, this can help me plan how much research is needed, a lot or a little.  It can be a very vague goal, at least to start with and especially until I understand a little better about how the research I want to do will be done.

What’s important is trying to visualize, in some way and up front, what I’m going to do before I do it.  And this is problematic as it requires me to do something I’ve become reluctant to do -- put effort into this blog that doesn’t wind up going directly onto the website.

In other words, if it’s not directly getting me out of having to do more work, why should I do it?  Isn’t that just more work?