Productivity and Procrastination

This blog started largely as a writing exercise. It’s not that I didn’t write before, but I that I didn’t write regularly. Writing, it seems, is one of those things that I either do every day or not at all.

I’ve found quite a lot of thing are like that. Though it’s easy enough to get through the routine of daily living, anything that is irregularly tacked on to that routine can too readily fall to the wayside. Over the last year and a half I’ve made great strides in adding things to a daily routine, such that I do them obsessively rather than occasionally. Things like, for example, making strides.

I still miss things occasionally…  all too often I find that it’s just too late in the evening to get done everything I want to do. The writing is one of those things in the not-quite-perfect category. Tonight, for example, I’m working. I have five hours left to post this and if work gets busy I might not finish at all.

“Perfect is the enemy of good” - Voltaire, paraphrasing someone else who has been forgotten.

I’ve heard a lot of things about procrastination over the years. Obviously, it could be laziness. Most of my procrastination probably comes in that category. Another cause of procrastination is apparently being too perfectionist… that’s a nice, flattering interpretation. I have heard that part-time MBA students whose degree is paid for by their employer are told to not get good grades… if they do, they are wasting too much time when they could be working.

“Don’t waste time getting ‘A’s” - Me, paraphrasing someone else who has been forgotten.

Perfectionism isn’t my failing, generally. But it certainly can become so when it comes to things that get seen in public, like this writing. Having a regular habit, that forces me to put something on the blank screen even when I have no idea what to say, helps break that mental block that says “this isn’t good enough to post”. It helps that I don’t write about any subjects I have any sort of expertise in… when all I’m saying is “this is what I think, probably, I guess, don’t quote me” that takes a lot of the pressure off.

Anyway, I’ve managed to pry a 15-minute break out of work to get this down. I think I’d better hit ‘publish’ before anything goes wrong.