by David Parker
One knock-on effect of this type of societal procrastination is similar to the new strains of super-bacteria that have grown stronger as they’ve grown resistant to antibiotics. It’s today’s career-politicians who have lost their fear of not doing the people’s will, upsetting the electorate, and being kicked out of office. After all, if no one shows up to vote them out of office, what consequences do they face?
When citizens stop taking action as a group, what happens, and what effect does this have on how we feel? Politicians divert their attention to the wishes of their true supporters, political action committees that provide campaign contributions from big business interests. Is it any surprise then when politicians vote in favor of lowering business regulations, and we then read news reports of peanut butter infected with salmonella bacteria, and of contaminated gourmet pet food causing kidney disease and deaths of our cats and dogs? We stare in wonder, as the world seemingly spins out of control, and feel hopeless and helpless.
The same holds true with regard to how much or how little control we exert over our own lives. If we neglect our needs, we feel poorly as a result, and should we continue this neglect, we may begin questioning our resolve. For many, this is the start of a long, downward slide into mental depression.
A Procrastinator in Motion—Is Going Nowhere, Fast
Many procrastinators feel separated from the rest of society, one they may perceive of as having an almost instinctive knowledge of how to take care of its tasks and responsibilities. The procrastinator feels cold, remote, and detached from others, who he sees as capable “do”-ers. As a result of his procrastinating, he not only feels inadequate to others, but worse, he may worry that he’s becoming incapable of living any other way of life. Most of the time, he feels stuck, especially when faced with a complicated task, or one that he perceives of as being boring.
For example, there were many times in my own past when I felt so overwhelmed, I simply froze and could not take action. During one particularly difficult and prolonged occurrence of procrastination, I telephoned a local crisis hotline due to the shame I felt when I realized that I was stuck mid-way through the job of plastering and painting the studio apartment I had moved into a few weeks before. Even worse, I began to worry that I might not be able to complete the job.
My furniture left me little room to negotiate, and I had never before taken on such a complicated job. One wall was half-puttied, while another that had been brushed with primer almost glowed in the dark, and the apartment reeked of plaster dust. Bed sheets covered my belongings and just lifting the sheets momentarily, resulted in small clouds of dust rising up into the air. It was a terribly depressing scene.
Hoping to prompt me into action, the hotline’s volunteer asked, “How about this? Can you just picture how nice your apartment will look, and how good you’ll feel after you’ve finished painting it?”
“No,” was my simple reply. No other word had the same clarity and honesty to express the way I felt. The only thing I could picture in my mind’s eye was myself as an utterly inadequate adult, and I was certain that this unfinished nightmare of a job could be done better and faster by just about any other person. So convinced was I of my inadequacies, the only outcomes I could foresee were either an apartment that looked worse after the paint job, or one that looked mediocre at best. In my twisted logic, it simply made no sense to continue, and for long periods of time I did nothing except to watch television while I internally cursed myself for my past bouts of inactivity; doing nothing to alleviate my situation other than distracting myself from this self-imposed misery.
During that time, it never seemed to occur to me that this was my very first experience in painting an apartment, especially one that first required extensive plastering, then a coating of primer, and last but not least, paint. Perhaps it might have been better to stop, assess the situation, and if necessary, hire professional painters and observe how they did the work, preferably from an easy chair. But I was stuck in the land of procrastination, and even if it was in spite of myself, I was determined to finish the job.
Somewhere between somehow and eventually, I finished painting my apartment. I recall feeling good for a short while, and feeling a sense of relief as well. However, as soon as that warm glow of satisfaction began fading, in its place I began reviewing, examining and criticizing the efforts that had brought that job to a close:
“Why didn’t I finish it sooner?”
“It really wasn’t that difficult, was it? Why am I so dumb?”
“What’s wrong with me?”
The typical habitual procrastinator lives in a self-contained and depressive world that, for the most part, consists of unrealistic expectations, broken self-promises, and frustration. We target ourselves with character assassination by placing unrealistic and unattainable demands upon ourselves. Plodding through life, we harbor anger at what we perceive of as an uncooperative world filled with people who seem more able and more capable of routinely coping with tasks—the same tasks that drive us to distraction. Yet, for the most part, our anger is directed at ourselves.
Procrastinating in the Workplace
Although I don’t know for certain the exact moment in time when I first began procrastinating, I can easily recall many times when it caused me great upheaval. Once, while working as a temporary office assistant at a television network in midtown Manhattan, I failed to see what all the fuss and bother was about a contract that needed to be sent overnight to Hollywood.
The next morning my supervisor came by, and she appeared more appalled over my lack of concern about the contract, still lying on my desk, than for the contract itself. Although I can now see that her concern was justified, I recall thinking at the time, “If it was so important, why did they trust it to a temp in the first place?” By the time of that incident, procrastination had already ingrained itself into my life so thoroughly that it hadn’t occurred to me that my job wasn’t just about taking care of things, like contracts, which I hadn’t done: it was more about taking care of my employer’s needs. It almost goes without saying that my job lived up to its name—“temporary,” and ended just a few days later.
Another time, a lawyer, whom I was assisting, complained that I spent too much time trying to figure out how to “do” something, rather than just “doing it.” Once again, I was only able to see the situation from my perspective, which left me wondering how one is supposed to simply “do.” At other moments, supervisors griped that although I did my work, it took me too long to get things done. While I strove to keep my emotions in check, I focused on the basics of my job, cringing whenever a superior suggested that I undertake a new responsibility. Here are some other comments I received in the workplace:
When faced with a task, I made “mountains out of molehills.”
One supervisor told me she suspected that I was “avoiding work.”
Another supervisor complained that I “thought too much.”
Indeed, many fellow procrastinators have told me that they’ve stared in amazement at co-workers who not only juggle the demands of a full-time job, but also take care of several children at home before and after work. It’s people like that for whom the adage, “If you want something done, give it to the busy person,” not just applies, but makes so much sense.
Procrastinating at Home
Not all procrastinators are the same. Some complain that while they have no problem with procrastination in the workplace, they find themselves immobilized by some of the simplest home-based tasks. They often say things like, “I do whatever is asked of me at work by my superiors. Anything they ask, and I do it. So you’d think I would do for myself at home, now wouldn’t you? I mean, if they told me to stand on my head for ten minutes, I’d do it, if I could—so long as they paid me for my time. Still, my home is a mess and sometimes I worry that a co-worker might invite me over for a party at his or her place, especially around the holidays—and that I’d feel obligated to return the favor. What would I do then
?”
Another sufferer said, “I have a large stack of newspapers sitting in a corner of my kitchen. Every morning I do the same thing: I go in there to make coffee and then, I see it. I tell myself, ‘This weekend, I’m going to tackle that.’ But then, when the weekend comes, I say to myself, ‘I’ll be dammed if I’m going to deal with that mess on my day off. I’ve got better things to do. I can’t be bothered with that right now.’ Of course, Monday morning rolls around again and then I walk into the kitchen to make coffee. The moment I see that pile still sitting there, well—I could cry. Then, I think to myself, ‘Not again! Why didn’t I take care of that mess over the weekend? What on earth’s wrong with me?’”
Another common home-based scenario happens when a procrastinator worries there isn’t enough time to finish everything he wants to accomplish. This in turn can lead to frustration, which can result in the avoidance of all productive activity and essentially, in shutting down. This all-or-nothing reaction is a coping mechanism that can quickly become habitual in nature, occurring whenever the procrastinator finds himself with spare time that otherwise could be put to use. One reason behind this automatic reaction is that many procrastinators have a poor sense of time, most especially, with personal or free time. What the procrastinator is really dealing with is the feeling of panic that results from having some time, because he has never learned how to effectively manage his free time. Not knowing how to cope in a situation that he’s been in many times before, he does the only thing he know, he panics, and then attempts to flee from these terrible feelings—substituting action for anything else, which is the act of procrastination.
Habitual procrastinators earn the title of habitual by practicing their craft steadily over a lengthy period of time, and as a result of this practice, they often have many undone tasks that require attending to. When the procrastinator has a bit of free time, he thinks of all that he’s put off and quickly becomes overwhelmed. “How could anyone jam years’ and years’ worth of tasks into a spare twenty minutes of free time?” he wonders. If you are a procrastinator, you may be asking, “So then, how do you get several years’ worth of tasks done in such a small amount of time?” Stay tuned. In the second half of this book, you’ll learn how to develop positive ways to cope with, and accomplish, your tasks.
Science Experiments in the Kitchen
Some readers might find this next procrastination example to be a bit hideous while others will hardly bat an eyelash and say, “Yeah. Been there—done that.” During one of my lowest points I stopped dealing with one of life’s necessities, the dishes. My kitchen sink was completely filled up with dirty dishes, used knives, forks, spoons, cereal bowls, coffee cups, pots, pans, and plastic food containers. Shortly thereafter the drain became clogged and stagnant water began accumulating in the sink.
It was the weekend, and I got by on fast food while putting off the task of dealing with the dirty dishes. Soon the unpleasant aroma of rotting food and foul water began to make its presence felt whenever I neared the sink, especially after mold had begun growing inside some of the containers. When I came home from work that Monday evening, I faced something that had the look and smell of a science experiment growing in my kitchen sink.
Annoyed at the mess, I reacted by doing the only thing a skilled and practiced procrastinator could do. I put my coat back on and went out into the brisk and chilly November evening to a twenty-four-hour convenience store to purchase a supply of paper plates, plastic utensils, and Styrofoam cups.
Looking back on it now, it’s difficult to decide what was the oddest aspect of that situation. Was it my refusal to deal with the dishes at the start, or how I had allowed the sink to get into that condition? Or, perhaps worst of all, why did going out to buy those disposable items seem like the perfectly logical action to take? After all, which would have taken the greatest amount of energy: cleaning the dishes, or going out into the cold night air to go shopping for plastic ware and paper plates after coming home from a long day at work?
What’s funny about this situation is that by avoiding the problem in that way, I delayed having dinner far longer than if I had just stayed home, cleaned one pot, began cooking, and then cleaned the rest. However, at that particular moment, my actions actually did make sense to me because not only did I not want to deal with the dishes—I also felt “I just couldn’t.”
In reality, I could have washed the dishes, however, by habitually procrastinating, I had convinced myself that I really was incapable of cleaning the dishes at that particular time, and probably as much in the foreseeable future too. In other words, as long as I had my disposable utensils, I no longer had an immediate need to deal with the situation in my sink.
“After all,” I rationalized, “I paid good money for those items—so, I might as well make use of them.” And, there the clogged sink stood, its contents secure, while the mold continued to grow. A few days later a more distinct odor began wafting from the sink and it was only when the stench became overpowering that I finally gave in, cleaning the accumulated items, not with dishwashing liquid but with scouring powder—all the while wearing long rubber gloves.
Even Though “I Did It”—“It” Doesn’t Really Count
Much to my own dismay, there were times, albeit rare ones, when no matter how difficult the task—I not only did it, but surprised myself at my ability to deal with unappealing tasks that I had put off for great lengths of time. This often happened with regard to housecleaning.
The rule concerning these all-out clean-ups was that they were permitted when, and only when, they were due to external forces. Their cause was usually for one of the following reasons:
Friends were coming over to visit.
Relatives were coming over to visit.
A girlfriend was coming over to visit, especially when it was a new girlfriend.
The landlord was coming over to visit.
The building’s super, plumber, a cable television installer, or some other type of handy person was coming over to do work in my apartment.
As far as I was concerned, doing a concerted “clean-up” under these circumstances just didn’t count, even if my place looked nicer for the effort. After all, the only reason I accomplished the task in the first place was because I worried, “If they see how I live, they’ll think, ‘He must be a nut,’” or, “If the plumber tells my landlord what condition my apartment is in, he might try to have my lease revoked.”
Of course, once the special event passed, it was back to business as usual, with me playing the hapless, helpless, and, essentially, hopeless procrastinator. However, even if it was just for a short while, my apartment looked like it belonged to the person that I yearned deep inside to be. In the span of time between when I began to clean up and when the last guests left, I saw that I really hadn’t lost my ability to make my place presentable. Instead, it seemed more that I had simply abdicated myself from that responsibility.
At the start of this section, I mentioned that, “Much to my own dismay, there were times, albeit rare ones, when no matter how difficult the task—I not only did it, but surprised myself at my ability to deal with unappealing tasks that I had put off for great lengths of time.” To be honest, perhaps I wasn’t quite as surprised as I was bothered. Bothered, because of the undeniable proof that I was actually capable of “do”-ing many of the tasks I had already convinced myself that I was utterly incapable of undertaking, let alone successfully completing. So, despite how much I might have told myself that a smaller task “didn’t count,” nevertheless, its successful completion counted a lot more than I gave it credit for.
Isn’t Procrastination a Fancy Name for Laziness?
As a procrastinator, there were a few occasions when practically all sense of my personal responsibility to myself seemed to fly out the window. I may have showered, shaved, and wore clean clothes, but that me was the one I presented to the world—the other me was a disaster. Not only was my apartment a mess, but my bills went unpaid until I re
ceived a second or third notice. Delaying the bills left me feeling overwhelmed, and during periods when my bills were left unpaid, nervous confusion and stomach pains plagued me. While I knew that I should be paying bills, I couldn’t bear dealing with them because just about every part of the process seemed to require too much effort. At the same time, the more I put off—the more I had to do.
Seeking understanding, comfort, and a bit of insight into my condition, I talked to trusted friends, neighbors, and with professionals in the mental health field. To my chagrin, every once in a while someone would ask, “David, are you sure that you’re not just being lazy?” All right, fair question—but my answer is a resounding “No.” Why? Let’s take a look at the following chart:
Procrastination Laziness
Procrastination is a long-term condition. It can last for years and stay with a person into the future without end.
Laziness comes and goes. The lazy person has far more control over his condition than the procrastinator could ever dream of having.
The procrastinator feels regret over his inaction and says, “I should have,” “Why don’t I?” and, “Why didn’t I take care of that when I had the chance?”
The lazy person acknowledges his situation with, “Yeah, I’m lazy, that’s me!” safe in the knowledge that he will act, long before it’s absolutely necessary.
Procrastination involves the cessation of important and even essential activities. A procrastinator may discover that he has run out of food or come home to no electricity because he hasn’t paid his bill for months.
While a lazy person may put things off, he also keeps one eye on his deadlines. He may come close to disaster, but he gets a jolly thrill after coming close to the edge of the falls, while not going over the side.
