Oorgo

Yeah I'll do that tomorrow.

I bookmarked a page months ago called procrastination, how to stop procrastinating - psychological self-help. It's a bit ironic that I put off reading it because it is a long read and takes some sort of attention span to finish. Anyways I figured New Years Day would be a perfect day to pull it out and go through it. A couple things freaked me out and by freaked out I mean enlightened, yeah sure, no wait, make that freaked me out.

There seem to be a fistful of procastinator types, and I'm pretty sure I'm almost every one of them. I'm a mixture of the two main groupings: Tense-Afraid and the Relaxed type. I sometimes blow off things because I don't want to do them, but then instead of actually forgetting about the shit I was supposed to do, it lingers in my brain like the garbage I was supposed to take out today and eats at me until I either do it or regret not doing it. Maybe that's why I always have a sense of doom about me, because deep down I think all those things I've put off will come back crashing down on me all at once, or in waves of unpleasantness.

Here are some of the types of procrastinators they give:
"perfectionist" "dreamer" "worrier" "defier" "crisis-maker" "over-doer"

I'm less of the latter, I tend to be under-done, the least amount of work possible is right for me. I'm less lazy than unorganized and fearful of failing or doing a half-assed job, so instead I put it off until I rush through it and you guessed it... it becomes less than perfect. You take bits of each of those (other than crisis-maker, I'm not as much a drama queen, don't listen to my wife) and that's me. I'm super defiant though, I'm defiant to the point of not coming in to work on time just to spite my previous employer every day of the last 2 weeks I gave. If you nag me at all about something that I deem less important there's a good chance I will do it at even a lesser pace than I was, or turn it around and somehow make you do it yourself. I worry constantly and my dreaming has always get me in trouble, oh and the first one perfectionist? I think that's what got me into trouble in the first place, I figured after the first few times of not doing something perfectly that it wasn't worth doing, and the putting off of things began.

If you are reading this and think "Eh, he's overthinking this, he can't be that much of a procrastinator, everything works out, just relax buddy" then you probably don't know me well enough. I've procrastinated things to the brink of disaster. Back in College I waited until 2 days before a wind ensemble jury to get a group of musicians to play in the combo I required to pass. I actually envisioned myself jumping in front of a bus because I couldn't take the pressure. Years later in University I waited until the weekend before a research project was due to type it all up... 20 or 30 pages worth. I HAD the stuff in notes but just was dreading the typing. Also only needing one course and some other stuff to graduate from University I came back to Alberta, but instead of finishing it up and getting my degree I've successfully procrastinated 12 years away.

Well I haven't gotten all the way through the article because I keep finding things to distract me, so I'll have to keep you informed of my progress. I know that I've put off this post until Jan 2nd, and it's actually a diversion from working on a big band chart that I've also put off for at least 9 years. Am I a hopless procrastinator? Hell probably, but dammit I have to try, I need to get some frickin' control over this bald tired car on an icy bridge that I call an existence, or the future will be a big drop into an frozen river with me clinging to my kids hoping they make something of themselves so as to keep me afloat.

Posted by Oorgo at January 1, 2006 07:11 PM Permalink - Category: Ponderings | TrackBack