Welcome to The Recovering Academic
A preview of my series and a little about me
In December, 2021, I made the most difficult decision of my life: I resigned a tenured faculty position that I’d held for 16 years and moved with my family to Pennsylvania. Two years after that, my ex and I divorced. The Recovering Academic is the story of my ongoing recovery, both from the broken reward system of academe and from two major life transitions.
Recovery takes many forms. My series features exclusive interviews, essays, and craft resources for writers. I follow the same rule for all of these features that I do for nonfiction: my life story is only worth sharing if it serves others more than myself.
If you have never read The Recovering Academic before, here are three popular free posts.
Leaving Academe Is Not Like Sabbatical (Sabbaticals are temporary. Leaving is a frontier that stretches out beyond the horizon.)
Academe Is Suffering From Foreign Occupiers (In which I reflect on the startling similarities between the Communist occupation of Czechoslovakia and the ways that branding now functions as the centralizing principle of universities.)
A Hymn To Hot Sauce (Gardening is one of my healing rituals, and I share the personal story of my fermented hot sauce along with the recipe.)
If you like what you find here, I hope you’ll consider upgrading your subscription. For a quick preview of what a paid membership unlocks, see my page, “The Best of The Recovering Academic.”
I’m offering a 40% discount on annual subscriptions through December 31, 2024. Annual subscribers can also claim one free coaching session (a $100 value).
Testimonials
“Working with Josh has absolutely improved the quality of my writing. But the greatest benefit is having a thought partner. It’s so easy to treat writing as a solitary experience when writing, for me at least, is really about sharing and being in conversation." — Beth Anne Macdonald
“Joshua Doležal writes with clarity, deep knowledge, and conviction on a range of topics from literature to family life to practical options for PhD graduates beyond academia. His posts are reliably well written and full of ideas, and liable to sparkle like the surface of a summer lake under a rope swing, challenging: You next.” —
,“Josh combines the critical thinking of an academic with the heart of a writer.” —
,“Joshua may be a ‘recovering" academic,’ but he remains a scholar and teacher and a writer of deep insight and sensitivity. He offers so much on his substack.” —
,“I can’t thank Josh enough for the transformational experience I had working with him as a writing coach. His expertise, dedication, and genuine passion for the craft have been instrumental in my growth as a writer. Josh has an uncanny ability to help writers tap into their inner power. What sets Josh apart is his commitment to fostering authenticity in every writer he works with. Josh's approach to coaching is not just about teaching writing techniques (though he offers plenty of that, too); it's about nurturing the writer as a whole. He encouraged me to embrace my unique voice and style, empowering me to write with confidence and conviction.” — DJ Lee, author of Remote: Finding Home in the Bitterroots
If you belong to the recovering academic community or know someone who has left academe, check out my tees and hoodies!
About me
I am a writer, award-winning teacher, and writing coach with 20 years of experience in publishing and editing. My mentor was Ted Kooser, former Poet Laureate of the United States and Pulitzer Prize winner. My work has appeared in more than 40 magazines, including these.
My memoir Down from the Mountaintop: From Belief to Belonging was shortlisted for the 2016 William Saroyan International Prize. It is available on Amazon, at The University of Iowa Press, and at many other places where books are sold.
I co-produced an oral history podcast, Mid-Americana: Stories from a Changing Midwest, which you can hear on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, and Spotify. Season 1, “Homecoming,” features stories from native Iowans who left the Midwest and then came back to stay. Season 2, “Immigration,” features stories from people who left their native countries to make a home in the Greater Midwest.
I am also father to three fantastic kiddos, who sometimes humor me with backcountry adventures and help me plan each year’s garden. In the hours before breakfast, you can usually find me running the back roads in central Pennsylvania or pumping iron with the other early birds.
I write for you! If you have a question I can tackle in a future post, feedback on what I could be doing better, or comments on something you particularly enjoy, I’d love to hear from you. Just reply to any message you receive or send me a private note at dolezaljosh@gmail.com.
Josh
https://drgvloewen.substack.com/p/on-self-loathing
I am imagining you and your readers might be amused by this piece, though I am not seeking sympathy here. GVL
Nicely done!