Thursday, March 27, 2014

Procrastination?

I have always believed that there is a time and place for everything. To be sure, the time is never now or even today; the place is never within a 100 kilometers of where I am present; and, needless to say, the person to do it is never me. That, however, does not detract from the central thesis - there is a time and place for everything!

Now, what has this to do with procrastination? Well, there are two ways to prove the benefits of anything. One can either directly attempt to list the benefits OR one can list the ills of the opposite to prove the inevitable rightness of one's position. Not that I have always adhered to my own position but that non-adherence is what has proved to me the essential goodness of procrastination.

There is a saying in Hindi that propagates the absolute opposite of procrastination. "That which needs doing tomorrow, do it today. That which needs doing today, do it now." Having taken that for gospel, I adhered to it. For example, I knew I needed to have dinner in the night. So, I ate enough for lunch and dinner for lunch. Of course, you cannot just adhere to your philosophy only once a day - a principle is no principle unless you follow it invariably. So, I ate enough for next day's breakfast AND lunch for today's dinner. This staunch adherence to the principles embodied in that saying should have reaped me rich rewards. It did! I had to change wardrobes - to the next higher size - once every two months AND was also in need of a Gelusil chaser for all my meals. Not quite the rewards that I was looking to get. THAT put me off this stupid philosophy and I became a staunch adherent of procrastination.

Unfortunately, I had also adopted that philosophy in other things. In office, I did what amounted to tomorrow's work today. All that it did was give the mistaken impression to my office that they had given me too little work. Which, in effect, meant that they kept adding to my workload till I could not even do yesterday's work today. And THAT conclusively proved to them that I was an inefficient employee. To think that people suggest adoption of this philosophy to give an impression of efficiency!

I look around at the current generation of employees and see further evidence of the underlying stupidity of this idea. They know that they will need to buy a car tomorrow; need to buy a house tomorrow AND, in staunch adherence to this concept, go ahead and do it all on credit today. Then, they groan through the rest of their lives burdened by EMIs that keep their nose to the grindstone and seeking ever-green pastures of more money. The problem is that everyone is doing it and will continue to do it - thereby pushing up the prices of houses - which, in effect, means that they just cannot postpone their purchase of a house since being late with it would put it well out of their reach. Ah! If only everyone realized the virtues of procrastination.

There is yet another problem with this philosophy. You either start off adhering to it OR you can never follow it. How are you ever going to do tomorrow's work today when the whole of last month's work is piled up for you to do? What is the use of a philosophy that cannot get a late convert? Take Procrastination. You can start off any time AND, no matter how long you have been idiot enough to follow the opposite, you can become an ace-procrastinator within a short period of time.

Ergo - given that the alternative has been proven to be conclusively moronic, Procrastination is the best philosophy. How sad, then, that it, like most of the ideals in life, is beyond the reach of most people!

38 comments:

  1. Eh.. Its because of my not following it ,that at workplace I am always free and people think I have no work! Same at Mum-in-laws place....I have heard that I am TEZ... keeps my work fit"
    Now I feign to be busy but still not going to be an ace-procrastinator.. sigh!

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  2. Hehehe....as always, you make a convincing case. And if you must know, I have been meaning to write a post like this for ages...but, as you know, there is always a time and place for someone else to do it for you if you just wait long enough! :P

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    1. SO - you have always been meaning for someone else to write a post like this :P

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  3. Er...I shall post my comment tomorrow, shall I? To show my solidarity for the priceless philosophy...

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    1. Hahaha! Now THAT accounts for the paucity of comments on this post :)

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  4. I agree Procrastination is the best philosophy... :D Only I pretend that I'm not procrastinating but waiting for the right time to do it ;)

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    1. I am trying to create a world where we need not make excuses for procrastination :)

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  5. Ha! What a relief! And I was beating myself about procrastinating so much in everything. Turns out that it is now a philosophy! Kewl, I say!

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    1. NOW I know why I was put into this world - to convert guilt trips to fashionable pride :)

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  6. I have a deadline to reach right now but you know I am waiting, what is the deadline reaches itself. Do I make any sense? We should make this a religion.

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    1. It isn't already? :) Then someone should :) The mantra of the religion would be 'Someone should do something about it some time" :)

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  7. Loved how you logically set the stage and conclusively proved that procrastination is the best policy.

    That being said, am wondering how long this particular post of yours sat in the 'draft' stage when you sat procrastinating as to when to post it on the blog :)

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    1. Don't ask :) I am still finding out which idiot pushed the 'publish' button :)

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  8. Brilliant points here, Sureshji!
    And I have tried that doing tomorrow's work today part in Office! I learnt it the hard way that such sincere employees are rewarded with more work!!! :)
    It was Kabir who said- 'Kal kare so aaj kar, aaj kare so ab, pal mein parlay hoyagi to bahuri karega kab?'
    I apply it to eating desserts & sweets! I have a good share today, lest the world should end and I miss my share :)

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    1. Hahaha! Same here! I apply that dictum ONLY to enjoying myself and NOT for work :)

      Thanks for increasing my knowledge - did not know it was Kabir!

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  9. Convincing point pushed across! It's quite a miracle you didn't procrastinate enough as you pushed the Publish button:)

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  10. You can convince a beggar to give his begging bowl away. I must send this post to my clients every time I miss a deadline :).

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    1. Hahaha! No - this was just tongue-in-cheek :) BUT feel free to use the post with your clients :)

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  11. As usual, you made me feel good and being on my tush, a beer in hand and HBO on TV. However, someone once said,"The sooner I fall behind, the more time I get, to catch up." :)

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  12. Here is one reader of yours who hardly procrastinates :P but yes I have suffered for getting work done before time, but never learnt from it. Damn, Procrastination is a lesson I need to learn fast :)

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    1. Don't procrastinate on learning to procrastinate :P

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  13. Have to conclude that one of the reasons we have corruption is because our politicians don't believe in procrastination. While collecting money for this election, they might as well collect some more for the next and all future elections and a little on the side for their family as well. [Borrowing Arvind Kejriwal's views on election funding during a q and a session with the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII)]

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    1. Ah! A little on the side for the family? :) That rests on the fundamental misconception that anyone - leave alone politicos - knows the meaning of 'enough' :)

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  14. Procrastination has become an integral part of our lives. Sensing this, even the deadlines for major cut-offs are extended. Excellent post, Suresh.

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  15. I'm still imagining you eating lunch for breakfast and dinner for lunch!!! LOL!!

    You are not alone Suresh..."someday" we'll form the procrastinators club!! :)

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    1. Two meals at a time Titli :) We certainly will - provided someone does something about it some day :)

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  16. I wonder why is it that we are always fighting what comes naturally to us..say procrastination ! I just love the zen philosophy which says that things will be done when they need to be done and basically bottom line, is don't do anything against the current :)

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    1. Hahaha! I am quite content without the last three words :) 'Don;t do anything' suits me fine even without the 'against the current' :)

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  17. How deftly you have slipped in the plague of consumerism in that post of yours! Procrastination is another matter though: old friends, aren't we?

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    1. Trust you to find those things that elude others in my posts, Uma! Makes it worthwhile writing them.

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  18. talk about EMIs today Suresh ! That in turn leads to people postponing a lot of other things like marriage and having kids ! As for procrastination in general it's simply adhering to ' better late, than never ' :)

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    1. Thankfully, I only hear of EMIs - do not have to experience them :)

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  19. Seems like I protracinated in reading this very post - Anyways I learnt the lesson very early. Even if I finish something well in advance at work, I will never turn it in till the last moment.

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    1. As did I :) And I always used to seek more time than I really needed :)

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