I’m sure that like me, a number of you suffer from that horrid malady known as procrastination. Now I’m not a psychologist, nor have I ever even taken the first class in psychology, so anything I say here is simply my perspective and personal understanding. I know that for most of us it’s just a bad habit. Something that we picked up as kids and have allowed to fester and grow until it is what it is, what ever level of lazy do nothing until the last moment that it has become in your life. But, for some of us it can also become a psychological problem that needs to be professionally dealt with like any other type of mental disorder. It’s a fear of doing or a fear of accomplishing something (maybe in psychological terms those are two different things?). Sounds bizarre but I’ve felt it before.
I first remember it (procrastinating) back in school. I’d have a project due but I wouldn’t have started it. The due date would be slowly creeping up on me, but I’d be putting it off, at first thinking that I still had time to get it done, then lying in bed at night worrying about telling myself that I’d get on it right after school the next day. The next day would come and other thoughts would occupy my mind until once more, in bed that night, I’d realize that the project/report/test was due in the morning. I’d lie awake almost sick to my stomach in fear of what was going to happen. Depending on what it was that was due, there was usually the hope that I wouldn’t have to hand it directly to the teacher that way she wouldn’t know right then and I could simply slip out of class, thereby putting off the inevitable confrontation another day.
As a young man I can remember not wanting to balance my checkbook or pay my bills and so I would “put it off”. For by balancing the checkbook and going over the bills I would have to face me own financial shortcomings due to my poor stewardship. Procrastinating and putting this off allowed me to return to my non contemplative thought processes thereby putting off the inevitable introspection that would occur. Needless to say, creditors, don’t want to hear about why the bill is late and banks don’t really care why the funds in your checking account are short.
I look back on all of this now from a slightly more mature perspective. I am still a procrastinator but not nearly as bad as I used to be. I have found that it is not so much a virtue to tackle things as they come to me and do so in a timely manner. No, it is more that it works out for my betterment and sanity to be done with my tasks. There is a greater feeling of accomplishment in being able to look back upon tasks completed than to look forward with dread on those things that still need doing. So you may ask, was my change simply a matter of “growing up”, or was it perhaps a self-help book that helped cure me? How did I come about this change in my thinking?
Introducith, The Wife! My wife doesn’t understand procrastination. It’s something that she absolutely abhors. If something needs doing then do it. Putting it off doesn’t change the fact that it still needs to get done. Now, this is not to say that she’s some kind of whirling dervish, dancing about the house every evening doing chores and what not, but she is quite methodical in her work and in the management of her time. I have therefore, by virtue of being her husband, “seen the light” in regards to the timely completion of my “to do list”.
And in a slightly twisted manner this brings me to the real reason for this post.
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