Preparing & Research


During a conversation with Adesola today, I had a bit of a lightbulb moment. I have been an actor and writer most of my life, but I had never undertaken the role of a ‘researcher’. Today, I realised that I had always seen research as this clear cut, clinical, unattainable thing. What I hadn’t quite understood was that research is just a means to develop understanding and doesn’t have to be closed minded or structured and clear cut. 

The conversation made me revisit my favourite Ted Talk with fresh eyes, ‘The power of vulnerability’ sees the brilliant BrenĂ© Brown talking about vulnerability as a strength, human connection and her research in a lot of depth. 

Upon rewatching, I realised that she approached her research with the same feeling I had: she wanted to break down ‘shame’ and understand it fully, putting it in to a neat little box that made total sense and wasn’t messy in any way. Of course, then she discusses how that year long project became six years of study, thousands of letters and got more ‘messy’ than she anticipated. The parallels in the type of research are interesting, as we are studying people’s narratives and experiences. These things are not clear cut, finite or the same for everyone. 

We are not looking for ‘the one perfect answer’, we are looking for differences, correlation between experiences, emotions, tone, expression, common statements. But crucially, no one-size-fits- all answer! I’m still figuring things out and trying to broaden my understanding of what purpose my research serves and what it encompasses! During the summer I’m going to be reading around my topic and trying to understand as much as I can around my question for Module 3. Until then, I will be watching this on repeat as I find it incredibly inspiring both in content and in my role as a researcher! 


We can’t ever achieve perfection in our research or our careers- life is messy and so we need to let that idea go to truly understand ourselves and others ✨



Axolotl by Dan Dawes- a piece about the perils of pursuing perfection 

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