Efficient
people are really lazy people in disguise--true or false? If you said false, you clearly aren't one of
us. The truth is we lazies strive to do as little as possible as quickly as
possible so we can get back to lazing around. Being efficient fits nicely with our
goals and, more importantly, it gets better press.
Case in point: a quick peek
at the dictionary reveals that "efficient" means being productive
with minimal effort, while "lazy" means requiring little or no
effort. See? They're the same. Except, of course, for the
synonyms. Oy! If you're lazy, you are indolent, shiftless and slothful. Slothful! When the best way to describe you is by invoking
the Seven Deadly Sins, you know you're in trouble.
On
the other hand, if you're efficient, Mr. Roget and his eponymous book can't
praise you highly enough. Not only are you energetic and economical, you are
also capable and clever, able and accomplished, shrewd and skillful, and also,
my personal favorite, virtuous.
Not to mention that lazy is often followed by the word
"bastard."
So unfair. And where's the gratitude? Where would the
rest of you be if we
hadn't perfected procrastination? Take Hamlet, the biggest procrastinator
of all time…okay, not a good example. Just remember this: procrastinating
is an art. A person may dabble for years and never become a virtuoso. Only a master procrastinator can leap from the precipice of
putting things off into the whitewater of wasted time, swim through the sea of
snide remarks, and all without drowning
Isn't it time the world lauded our contributions to
society? Look at our magnificent "Paper Self-Management System" which
enables offices everywhere to run smoothly. Also known as
"Elimination by Procrastination," this system allows the user to
dispose of piles of paperwork without ever touching them. The secret lies in
recognizing which documents will take care of themselves without human
intervention. It also works with e-mails, texts and voicemails.
Another of our crackerjack accomplishments is, "National Procrastination
Week."
Troubled by the stressful lives of our friends and neighbors, we wanted to show
them an easier life--our life, and so we instituted "National Procrastination
Week"(March 4-10),
to promote the many benefits of putting off until tomorrow everything that
needn’t be done today. You're welcome.
Of course, I would be remiss if I didn't introduce you to
some famous procrastinators in history. First, we have President Woodrow Wilson
who prohibited child labor, limited railway workers to an eight hour day,
declared war on Germany and wrote fourteen points about something or other. I
should probably look that up. I'll do it later, I need a snack first … oops,
where was I? Oh yes, the important thing was Wilson's firm belief that: "Today's greatest labor-saving device is tomorrow."
And then there's Mark Twain, father
of American literature and the greatest humorist of his age. He was one of
ours, too. Did you know he changed his name to Mark Twain because it took too
darn long to write Samuel Langhorne Clemens? Think of all the time he saved
over a lifetime! He even patented several time-saving devices including the
"Improvement in Adjustable and Detachable Straps for Garments" (to
replace suspenders) and a self-pasting scrapbook featuring pages coated with
dried adhesive that only required moistening. Genius!
And talk about efficient, when Twain
learned that his birth coincided with the appearance of Halley's Comet, he
declared that he would die when it returned. And, of course, he did. His motto
was: "Never put off until tomorrow what
you can do the day after tomorrow."
Our third American hero is
Les Waas, founder and president of the "Procrastination Club of America." The club boasts 12,000 active
members and millions more who are planning to join, but haven't gotten around
to it. The club started as a joke when Waas and some friends hung a sign up in
a hotel that read: "The procrastination's club meeting has been
postponed." Waas has been president for fifty-five years and explains that
while the club would like to award an annual "Procrastinator of the Year,"
they are still waiting for the nominating committee to make a recommendation.
(Steel, Piers, PhD. The Procrastination Equation. New York: Harper
2010).
So, what are the roots of procrastination? Is this just a
modern-day reaction to our perpetual busyness? Excellent questions, glad you
asked. Some ancient civilizations did embrace the concept of procrastination. Indian philosophy, for example, gives
equal weight to the paths of action and inaction, and one of the
foundations of Zen Buddhism is to live in the moment, aware of your actions,
thoughts and sensory perceptions.
Hey multi-taskers! Turn off your phones and pay
attention. You don't see any Buddhist monks racing around town picking up their
dry cleaning and dropping off their dog at the vet, do you? That's because
they're serene. They're living in the moment. They’re
in tune with their inner selves. Nah, they're probably just procrastinating…
The bottom line is: don't feel guilty for
procrastinating. The important stuff will get done eventually and the other
stuff will take care of itself. It turns out some of the most creative
people are the biggest procrastinators. Virginia Woolf wrote in A Room of One's Own: "It
is in our idleness, in our dreams, that the submerged truth sometimes comes to
the top." See? You weren't procrastinating, you were just being
creative!
This is a sample from my e-book, "A Trip to the Hardware Store & Other Calamities," available on Amazon for only $0.99. Such a deal!
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