Productive Procrastination

In order to best remain true to my procratinating tendencies, I have been completely unable to accomplish the extent of my goals for this evening. At least not yet. I am still trying to overcome my aversion to completing a task before the last possible minute, so maybe before I turn in for the night I will finish at least one thing. One thing I am working on is a presentation for this coming Monday, and I am near completion. It is a scary feeling to be so far ahead of schedule, thus my inner procrastinating self is rebelling strongly. I do not know this feeling of being ahead of the game, and it is being rejected by every fiber of my being. In order to divert my attention from this strange feeling, I took a few minutes to read about another procrastinator's story...

He very wisely describes his theory of structured procrastination:
"All procrastinators put off things they have to do. Structured procrastination is the art of making this bad trait work for you. The key idea is that procrastinating does not mean doing absolutely nothing. Procrastinators seldom do absolutely nothing; they do marginally useful things, like gardening or sharpening pencils or making a diagram of how they will reorganize their files when they get around to it. Why does the procrastinator do these things? Because they are a way of not doing something more important. If all the procrastinator had left to do was to sharpen some pencils, no force on earth could get him do it."

And one more bit of wisdom:
"Procrastinators often follow exactly the wrong tack. They try to minimize their commitments, assuming that if they have only a few things to do, they will quit procrastinating and get them done. But this goes contrary to the basic nature of the procrastinator and destroys his most important source of motivation. The few tasks on his list will be by definition the most important, and the only way to avoid doing them will be to do nothing."

Very interesting. I like the way this guy thinks; I can understand and relate. We must suffer from the same disorder. Lucky for me, he has already figured out how to master this weakness and turn it into strength. All I need to do is find something more important to do than this presentation, and I will have it finished in no time.

More info:
http://www.structuredprocrastination.com/