Sunday, February 12, 2006

For all procrastinators

Well since only five people read this blog, it'll be clear who this is for. Psychology Today has an interesting article outlining 10 facts about procrastinators.

6. Procrastinators tell lies to themselves. Such as, "I'll feel more like doing this tomorrow." Or "I work best under pressure." But in fact they do not get the urge the next day or work best under pressure. In addition, they protect their sense of self by saying "this isn't important." Another big lie procrastinators indulge is that time pressure makes them more creative. Unfortunately they do not turn out to be more creative; they only feel that way. They squander their resources.
7. Procrastinators actively look for distractions, particularly ones that don't take a lot of commitment on their part. Checking e-mail is almost perfect for this purpose. They distract themselves as a way of regulating their emotions such as fear of failure.
8. There's more than one flavor of procrastination. People procrastinate for different reasons. Dr. Ferrari identifies three basic types of procrastinators:
    • arousal types, or thrill-seekers, who wait to the last minute for the euphoric rush.
    • avoiders, who may be avoiding fear of failure or even fear of success, but in either case are very concerned with what others think of them; they would rather have others think they lack effort than ability.
    • decisional procrastinators, who cannot make a decision. Not making a decision absolves procrastinators of responsibility for the outcome of events.

1 Comments:

Blogger J. Ben Ranz said...

GW, might you have been procrastinating when you found this article?

I agree with the statement that procrastinators tell themselves lies...I'd never thought about it in that sense. I also never thought to classify someone as a procrastinator...does procrastinating sometimes make someone a procrastinator? Or is there no such thing? Do procrastinators ALWAYS procrastinate? This article seems to talk about them like they were sex offenders or something..."this is the behavior of procrastinators"...I think it would be more appropriate to say "this is the behavior of someone who is procrastinating."

As usual, mine is not an informed opinion, so feel free to take it with a grain of salt. After all, I prefer comedy central over CNN any day of the week and twice on Sunday.

8:15 PM  

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