“Procrastination is bad” they say.
“It keeps you distracted from the important things,” I hear too often.
“It’s a lazy person’s excuse to be lazy…”
Too many times I have heard this. Not (always) directed at me -- but it's always that one 15-letter word.
I hear it from my teachers, my professors, my friends, and my parents.
"Procrastinators never turn in anything of actual quality."
Well I say they are wrong!
I'm sure if they went back to college nowadays, in the golden age of the internet, where mind-thieving sites like Reddit, YouTube, and Instagram lie in wait, they would be more understanding towards the "procrastinators."
Life is just so much harder with social media.
Maybe they would even understand how it fuels our creativity. How it isn't always harmful and how it can breathe life while simultaneously draining time. A double-edged sword, truly.
It's important to know that putting something off is not always a negative thing.
So this one goes out to YOU, the one who saves it for later.
You're not so bad, really.
You just have to know when to shift into overdrive. Like when your assignment is due the next day. You can have fun for the two weeks before. A little pressure always gives a good kick start!
Here's What I Have for You!
No longer will your voice be drowned out by the productive populace known as “go-getters” and “self-starters.”
It’s time we banded together and told them to choke on their prickly judgment and icy looks of disapproval.
If you're one of those "prude" folks then read on and learn to change your cruel, cruel ways. If your one of those chillaxed chillers, then by all means chill because I got your back here.
Procrastinate.
GAWD that word sucks.
Seriously, every time I hear it I'm covering my ears like a kid.
And drowning it out with some Naughty Boy and Sam Smith.
The word just sounds too professional. It’s irritating when people use the same term and never take the time or effort to find a synonym.
For some reason such people seem to find the need to replace all the fun words like “dilly dally” or “dawdle” with wicked words that are excessively complex in order to show off how absolutely splendid and marvelous their vocabulary is!
Their intelligence quotient must be immensely higher than the average mammal! What peasants...
It’s crazy—really—thinking
that these really smart people can
still only find one word to say “delay.”
I swear sometimes really smart people make up words just to sound superior.
Like perfunctory. And avant-garde. And filibuster! And fornicate!
Who decides when a word becomes a word, anyways? I'd love to sign up or submit a couple to the board to review!
Putting my other vocabulary issues aside for a moment, however, I would like to address the formal definition of “procrastinate.”
According to Merriam-Webster’s online dictionary, procrastinate means:
“to be slow or late about doing something that should be done : to delay doing something until a later time because you do not want to do it, because you are lazy, etc.”
You know what I see here?
I see a lot of negative connotation.
I see a lot of loaded negativity that doesn’t address any of the positive aspects related to procrastination.
I see nothing related to the pros, the pluses, or the progressiveness hidden within each little moment of procrastination.
I’d like to take a moment and give you a chance to go ahead and give Merriam-Webster the bird. When you are done you can watch this YouTube video in order to simmer down and return to a calmer state of mind.
Watched it? Good. You've now gotten your daily dose of Husky Pride and may proceed to read.
Go Dawgs!
I’m coming at you now with a much more positive word for that 15 letter piece of trash that I’ve been ranting about.
A blogger named Ray Del Savio calls it “concepting.”
He takes the stance that procrastination is really just a period of time where one uses his or her environment to become energized or better equipped to complete the task at hand.
And personally, it works great! After downing some Doritos and watching that Husky puppy video that I linked three more times I was able to finish this article in a jiffy.
Before I took the time to get away from my work this was me:
2:32 in the morning. Blank Stare. Eyes Glazed over. Two-thirds finished with a brand new back of Cheez Its and looking deeply into my laptop screen just hoping that my work would magically complete itself so that maybe I could go back to watching strange and obscure Youtube videos.
My savior came in my last Cheez It. On my way to grab a new bag (Costco sized, mind you) I passed the flickering television and decided "Hey...this looks...ummm moderately interesting" and I sat down for 15 minutes.
Which became 20.
Which became Youtube videos.
Which became the topic for this article. Which then essentially wrote my work for me. The words were able to flow!
It goes to show that if you can approach every subject with a shitty attitude you can get bored and do something else and in turn do anything.
Trust me.
So next time your English professor demands that you turn in an annotated thesis paper on Huckleberry Finn just let them know that you'll get to it after you fulfill your basic needs:
1. Eat.
2. Sleep.
3. Put a roof over your head.
4. Check Twitter
5. Do that Essay.
All the essentials in perfect order.
I had originally planned on making a much stronger point in my argument here...
Something about how putting things off lets you take a mental break, achieve clarity, and even give you strokes of creative genius!
But instead I watched this weird compilation of people getting badly hurt on pogo sticks!
Maybe you shouldn't procrastinate after all -- if you want to get more polished work done that is!
Or say screw it and click here to waste the next couple hours of your life.
