Monday, January 15, 2007
Mañana - Is good enough for Dave
[From 2002. Reposting all of this stuff makes it feel like I am actually doing some work on this blog!]
Procrastination. Doing tomorrow what you could possibly do today. I am a master of it. Just look at the number of articles that I have written for this site. It was meant to be one a month, but in reality it is one whenever it happens. I start off, as I do with so many things, with a strong desire and a promise to myself that I will work hard and get it done...
...And then I don't do that much.
Anything that does get done, gets done in a rushed hour or two when it is absolutely necessary, or when I have gotten so disgusted at myself that I just have to do it. Usually, my efforts at alleviating procrastination are just a way of procrastinating on something else.
This article is a perfect example. I have a ton of other things to do at the moment, but I just don't want to do them. So I busy myself with writing a pointless article that no one will ever read. I justify this to myself thusly: "Well, at least I am writing. At least I am doing something. I am flexing the old writing muscle, which is exactly what I need to do in order to get that other writing task completed. That's what I am doing, I'm warming up!"
When I have finally finished this task I know that I will feel a sense of satisfaction. I have actually achieved something. The fact that that something has nothing to do with what I originally intended to do is of no real importance. I am on a high. I can now sit back and look at my accomplishment and think, "Wow, I have done something". But after a while, the high disappears and I sink again into the depths of procrastinatic depression.
The fact is, dear reader, I am a sick, sick man. I am writing this article, really, as a confession. I am sick of my procrastination and I want it to stop. The tempting thing to say here is that I will get around to doing that, but this type of black comedy is just so many tears from a clown. So let me just get it out in the open.
"Hi, My name is David, and I am a procrastinator".
There, that's the first step. That is meant to be the biggest step and it wasn't too hard. Everything else is meant to be easy, once I have made that admission. Isn't it?
Now I am supposed to tell my story, which is sort of what I have been doing so far, isn't it? Oh well, here it goes. I went to school for a long time. Then I went to university after that. I chose to study physics because (and I kid you not), the line for physics was shorter than the line for biology, which I what I originally intended to study.
After I finished my bachelor's degree, I enrolled in a master's and then a PhD. While a postgraduate student, I met my wife to be. I proposed to her after a year of going out. It took another 5 years to get married, however, because I kept on putting the wedding preparation off.
Now I am a lecturer at the same university that I studied at. I kept meaning to find other employment, but you know how it is...
...And that brings me up to today. So you can see from this that I have spent my entire life procrastinating. I have even had the same best friend for the past 20+ years. I keep meaning to go out and find new friends, but I never quite get around to it.
Now I am meant to make apologies to all of the people I have wronged by my procrastination. Damn these 12 steps! Now I will have to go out and talk to them because some of them haven't gotten around to getting email accounts yet (or even computers, in some cases).
I guess I will just have to put this step off until I can get around to it…and there it is again. One of these days someone is going to have to come up with a program with fewer steps in order to stop procrastination.
Now that it is time to finish the article, I suppose I should write something witty, just to give the article that sense of closure, but truth to tell... I don't really have the time right now. After all, I have a lot of other stuff to do (which all has to be done urgently), and it's such a nice day outside, and... well... you know how it is...
I'll just finish this tomorrow.
Procrastination. Doing tomorrow what you could possibly do today. I am a master of it. Just look at the number of articles that I have written for this site. It was meant to be one a month, but in reality it is one whenever it happens. I start off, as I do with so many things, with a strong desire and a promise to myself that I will work hard and get it done...
...And then I don't do that much.
Anything that does get done, gets done in a rushed hour or two when it is absolutely necessary, or when I have gotten so disgusted at myself that I just have to do it. Usually, my efforts at alleviating procrastination are just a way of procrastinating on something else.
This article is a perfect example. I have a ton of other things to do at the moment, but I just don't want to do them. So I busy myself with writing a pointless article that no one will ever read. I justify this to myself thusly: "Well, at least I am writing. At least I am doing something. I am flexing the old writing muscle, which is exactly what I need to do in order to get that other writing task completed. That's what I am doing, I'm warming up!"
When I have finally finished this task I know that I will feel a sense of satisfaction. I have actually achieved something. The fact that that something has nothing to do with what I originally intended to do is of no real importance. I am on a high. I can now sit back and look at my accomplishment and think, "Wow, I have done something". But after a while, the high disappears and I sink again into the depths of procrastinatic depression.
The fact is, dear reader, I am a sick, sick man. I am writing this article, really, as a confession. I am sick of my procrastination and I want it to stop. The tempting thing to say here is that I will get around to doing that, but this type of black comedy is just so many tears from a clown. So let me just get it out in the open.
"Hi, My name is David, and I am a procrastinator".
There, that's the first step. That is meant to be the biggest step and it wasn't too hard. Everything else is meant to be easy, once I have made that admission. Isn't it?
Now I am supposed to tell my story, which is sort of what I have been doing so far, isn't it? Oh well, here it goes. I went to school for a long time. Then I went to university after that. I chose to study physics because (and I kid you not), the line for physics was shorter than the line for biology, which I what I originally intended to study.
After I finished my bachelor's degree, I enrolled in a master's and then a PhD. While a postgraduate student, I met my wife to be. I proposed to her after a year of going out. It took another 5 years to get married, however, because I kept on putting the wedding preparation off.
Now I am a lecturer at the same university that I studied at. I kept meaning to find other employment, but you know how it is...
...And that brings me up to today. So you can see from this that I have spent my entire life procrastinating. I have even had the same best friend for the past 20+ years. I keep meaning to go out and find new friends, but I never quite get around to it.
Now I am meant to make apologies to all of the people I have wronged by my procrastination. Damn these 12 steps! Now I will have to go out and talk to them because some of them haven't gotten around to getting email accounts yet (or even computers, in some cases).
I guess I will just have to put this step off until I can get around to it…and there it is again. One of these days someone is going to have to come up with a program with fewer steps in order to stop procrastination.
Now that it is time to finish the article, I suppose I should write something witty, just to give the article that sense of closure, but truth to tell... I don't really have the time right now. After all, I have a lot of other stuff to do (which all has to be done urgently), and it's such a nice day outside, and... well... you know how it is...
I'll just finish this tomorrow.
# posted by David and Melissa @ 01:56 
