Saturday, September 27, 2008

Is Procrastination Healthy?

Seriously, Is Procrastination Healthy? is an actual article and, being the procrastinator that I am, I just had to check it out. Here's what I learned:

Procrastination is good (i.e., "The peculiar genius of desperation and 4 a.m. logic is a fecund contributor to the national product."), except when it isn't (e.g., "When relationships are ruined, spouses feel betrayed, bosses are disgusted, and a person is frozen, frustrated, and disillusioned with that nonperformer staring back in the mirror ... procrastination is an enemy to mental health.").

Also, did you know that there are six different types of procrastinators? 1) Perfectionists, 2) Dreamers, 3) Crisis Makers, 4) Worriers, 5) Defiers, 5) Overdoers (all defined in the article). What I want to know is … what if someone falls into more than one category? For example, I tend to be a dreamer and a perfectionist (although occasionally I am either a worrier or a defier).

Furthermore, research has shown that procrastinators don’t benefit from time-management training because procrastinating is not an inability to manage time, but a “glitch” in the procrastinators’ personality style. So … in order to overcome the tendency to procrastinate, or at least to reduce the frequency, the procrastinator has to change her thinking.

I know that sometimes procrastination is healthy, but, when it comes to my writing, I’m the dreaming perfectionist who never gets started … I’ve been meaning to edit my NaNoWriMo 2007 novel, and I haven’t even begun the process (which includes printing the document out, single-sided and double-spaced, and reading through it with pen in hand). However, this procrastination article, and several other books I have been reading, just might get me started.

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