Why Wait?

Why wait – I guess because I can. There’s an old adage – “Why do today what you can put off until tomorrow?” That about sums it up. I am a chronic procrastinator. My mind has never worked in small, measured increments. Of course, this makes things difficult when I’m trying to impress upon my students to do their assignments a little at a time instead of trying to cram everything in at the last minute. But, who am I to talk?

I am a crammer. I know what has to be done. I mull things over in my mind for days, weeks, sometimes months. I have been both blessed and cursed with the ability to put big projects off and then complete them in a flurry of frenzied activity. Funny thing is, I always manage to pull these things off flawlessly.

I read somewhere that procrastination is the mark of the perfectionist. Me? Perfectionist? If you’ve ever seen my house, or my desk, it’s hard to fathom. But my organized clutter is actually the stamp of the perfectionist. I blame it on a third-grade friend. I was a huge fan of Nadia Comaneci at the time. Remember her? Perfect 10’s in every event? See, this friend had given me a poster of Nadia on beam in her signature pose – the caption: “Anything worth doing, is worth doing well.”  It’s a phrase that still resonates with me today. If I can’t complete a task perfectly, it won’t get done. Things must be done “just so,” and if I haven’t the time to do it the way it “must” be done – it doesn’t get done.

And so it goes with my schoolwork. For as long as I can remember, I have never completed assignments little by little. I always wait for a time when I can concentrate my full, uninterrupted attention to the task. Set aside time each day to do it? BWAAAHAHAHAHAA! No – I must be able to sit and devote my full energies on it from start to finish. This approach has always worked well for me. My grades have always been stellar. As I write, I have three 15-credit courses sitting on a shelf. Yet, here I sit – blogging.

 Hi, my name is Lisa, and I’m a chronic procrastinator. Do they have a twelve step for my condition? If they do, the meeting is probably tomorrow.