Interlude: Reflection, Authorship, and Best of 2023

At the end of the year, I like to do a Past-Year Review. I typically follow the original strategy by Tim Ferriss. But this year, I did something a little different.

Like Tim suggests, I created lists of positive activities to prioritize and negative activities to avoid. But when I reviewed each item in my lists, I also asked myself why I listed the item in a particular category. This extra step helped me learn the root of what needs to be addressed.

For example, if a particular project made my negative list, was it because I didn't find the project inspiring? Or was it because the project was not well managed? Or was it because I was having a tough week?

Sometimes we just need to address the root of the problem rather than avoid the problem altogether.

Do you have a practice for reflecting on the past year? Hit reply and let me know. I'd love to learn other ways that I can reflect and grow.

Now onto the last round-up of 2023...

💌 Round-up

🎉 Featured

Best Practices to Guide Decisions of Authorship and Author Order in a Research Manuscript​
I'm delighted to share my latest publication in the AMWA Journal. In the article, I share how to determine who qualifies for authorship, in what order authors should be listed, and strategies for how teams can prevent authorship conflict when writing a research manuscript.

💻 From My Desk

Top 10 Scientific and Medical Writing Articles in 2023​
I recently reviewed which of my resource articles were most read during the past year. This review helps me learn what resources you find most useful so that I can create more resources to help you become the best writer you can be. This article includes my 10 most-read articles on scientific and medical writing in 2023.

🎧 Listening

​Super Brain: 10 Things to Eat, Think, & Do to Improve Your Memory and Learn Faster​
In this episode of The Mel Robbins Podcast, Jim Kwik shares how to read faster, how to remember someone's name, and how you can better retain information with visualization strategies.

🧰 Tools

​How to play background music on Zoom—without sharing your screen​
I recently hosted an online workshop and wished that I could play background music while the attendees worked on their exercises. So I looked up whether it was possible to play music in a Zoom meeting—and it is!

💬 Quote

“We do not learn from experience… we learn from reflecting on experience.” – John Dewey

📝 Experiment

Before the end of the year, take 45-60 minutes to do a Past-Year Review. Then take the added step of asking yourself why each item landed in the positive or negative category. Did you learn anything that surprised you?

Thank you so much for reading.

Warmly,

Crystal