Powerful Procrastination
/Intro
I really should be working on that screenplay I told myself I'd finish by August 1st. But instead I'm writing this blog post.
Before we go any further, there's 4 things you should know about me:
I'm...
Interested in lots of things especially: tech, music, film, real-estate
Energized by learning new things
Not often bored
Project oriented
Not great at advanced math
So keep that in mind as you read.
Overview
I procrastinate. I'm excellent at it. In fact, I'm so good at finding ways not do things, I'd say procrastination is one of my highly developed skills (along with walking and talking).
Yet somehow I still get things done.
This seemingly irreconcilable paradox is possible due to some brain trickery I've discovered. Simply put: I've decided not to let my highly developed procrastination skills go to waste.
For instance, since I'm project oriented, I'll use projects to procrastinate on other projects.
To give you a sense for what I mean by "project" here's an overview of what's on my mind right now:
Remodel of investment property
Updates for Rachel's Web site
Complete re-write of Wylio
Writing a feature length screenplay
Learning Meteor.js
Contemplating a half dozen or so concepts for Web startups
Working on those songs I plan to make into an album someday
Design things for my Cafe Press site labelmegeek.com
Write on this Blog
Some of these projects are forefront in my mind, others have been moved to the back burner. I also have things like bookkeeping, daily exercise, eating, and typical around-the-house maintenance that occupy my time.
Conclusion
I've found that I can stay relatively productive by tricking the "procrastination" part of my brain (I think it's that big part that complains when I have to mow the lawn) into thinking it's procrastinating by working on one of my other projects instead of the project I "should" be working on.
This is what it looks like...
Regular Procrastination Brain
Challenge:
"Hey, you really should be working on that screenplay."
Response:
"Oh, I better check to see what cool new cameras were released in the last four hours"
Powerful Procrastination Brain
Challenge:
"Hey, you really should be working on that screenplay."
Response:
"Time to check on my blog, when was the last time I wrote one? Maybe I'll just start that real quick first."
There's probably a technical well-known-in-behavioral-science term like "productive task transference" for what i've just described. If so, I don't know it. That would require... research. If you'll note "researching behavioral science terms" is not on my project list. But now that I think about it, it does sound interesting...
Anyway, I decided to call this little productivity technique Powerful Procrastination. "Decided" means: 15 minutes ago I thought to myself "I guess I'll title my blog post powerful procrastination."
While it's not ideal, I've found powerful procrastination is more productive than just surfing the Web or watching the third season of Walking Dead that recently appeared on Netflix (Besides... I already did that).
So that's it. Since I don't have much more to say on the subject... the end.
Oh, you know what'd be cool? I should end this with a little square, or a fancy symbol you see in magazines that shows you you're at the end of an article. I better surf the web to find the alt code for one.
So do you procrastinate? Do you have any tricks for working through your procrastination? ♦
