We Can Be Heroes

Procrastination, Victory and Babylon 5

This article was floating around the internet a couple days ago and it’s worth a read for anyone interested in why they’ve never achieved some of their goals. I’d wager that’s just about everyone reading this. Normally I’d just link to it and leave it be, but I feel that the author didn’t really go far enough, and I’d like to pull some conclusions out of it.

To crudely summarize the article; you never accomplish your goals because you procrastinate. This is not necessarily because you are lazy or lack will power or aren’t as “good” as that other person (you know the one). It’s because you operate on the false assumption that Later-You, the one who you are saying will do the thing you’re putting off now, is a different person than Now-You. Later-You will make a different choice than Now-You is making. This is, generally, bullshit. Unless you have some sudden revelation or near-death experience, you will not be massively different later on and you will make the same choices.

Why is this? There can be a number of reasons. Maybe the task you want to accomplish is unpleasant (the dentist is a good example for me). Or maybe it’s not really something you want to do, just something you would like to want to do. You say this will be the year you start volunteering at the homeless shelter, or start taking your photography seriously. But are these really things you want to do? Maybe not. I think this is the first important thing to really look at with your goals. Are they really things you want to accomplish, or just something you’d like to think you want?

For me, this is running. I’d love to be able to say I was a runner, that I hit the road every morning rain or shine and did 5k. I look jealously at the man I drive by on my way to work who is out there, without fail, every morning. 

I don’t really want that, though.

I did have a period of enjoying running in my life, but it’s gone now. I have issues with my leg and gait that would require expensive and time-consuming therapy and maybe even surgery to correct. It may be that if I could learn to run bare foot (via my Vibrams) I’d be able to do this. But to really invest the time (and money, but mostly time) into this…it’s not something that’s worth it to me.

This is, I’d say, the second thing to look at about your goals. Unless you spend a large amount of time literally sitting and twiddling your thumbs, to accomplish something big and meaningful means something else in your life has to go. Maybe that’s some time spent playing World of Warcraft, an extra hour of sleep, a coffee with a friend or missing that new episode of Glee (or watching it later on a DVR) just as it airs. You’re not Superman, and your time is limited. If you want to be that guy who gets up at 5am and runs, you have to somehow learn to survive on less sleep or sacrifice something the night before. 

Take a wild guess which is the easier of those two choices.

The third thing about goals that you have to realize is that often they do mean a fundamental change in the person you are. This is, I think, what the article I’ve linked to really illustrates well. The last paragraph is gold:

Capable psychonauts who think about thinking, about states of mind, about set and setting, can get things done not because they have more will power, more drive, but because they know productivity is a game of cat and mouse versus a childish primal human predilection for pleasure and novelty which can never be excised from the soul. Your effort is better spent outsmarting yourself than making empty promises through plugging dates into a calendar or setting deadlines for push ups.

This is the key right there. To achieve your goals you have to realize you will probably never really want to do that thing you keep putting off. You’ll never really be in the mood for a 5am run or to spend hours photographing grass in different lights. The key is to decide if this means that it’s not something you really want to accomplish, or if it means it’s time to just go and do it, that it’s important enough for you to sacrifice pleasure right now.

I think it’s about changing your mind and deciding what is important to you and what’s not. When reading this I was reminded of a quote that, in my mind, was credited to Sun Tzu, but when I looked it up, ended up being from Babylon 5.

Claim victory in your heart and the Universe will follow.

This is what beating procrastination is about, claiming victory over it in your heart, and in your mind, and then letting the rest follow through.