procrastination

I spent three hours of my day at the vet, waiting to hear what's wrong with our cat. Three long hours with nothing to do. Plenty of time to do something light, like writing.

But I didn't write, obviously. It wasn't the time to write. Even though I would have had a good chance to do it, and entertain myself for a while at the same time. Perhaps to pass the time more quickly. I just couldn't get started.

Getting started is hard. Everybody knows that. And therefore there are countless tips and guides on how to get started. After all, once you get started everything will be fine. Right?

Not necessarily. It can also be hard to keep going in the middle, but what I'm talking today is finishing something. Not just get something done, but actually get it done, once and for good.

It might not be that easy as it sounds. It is, in a matter of fact, possible to procrastinate finishing up something. I found it out today. 

Why are we so bad at making good choices about our future? Why do we need to get everything now, immediately? Why can't we wait a while longer and enjoy better rewards later?

Given a choice of getting something little right now versus getting something considerably more later it always feels more tempting to get the instant reward. You need it right now. There is no guarantee you want it anymore after a while.

And besides, it's far in the future, surely there are more options coming up later to make things up. 

Close those other tabs, turn of Slack, don't open the mail and put away your phone. Go get another cup of coffee and then we start.

Got your coffee? Good, now open the "write new post" - page and start writing!

There is the voice in my head telling me every morning I should write. It's telling me I could check those mails later, there shouldn't be anything urgent I would need to do before starting. But those are just suggestions and as such can be disregarded. So every time I find myself procrastinating with work.