Procrastinators Anonymous is a fellowship of men and women who share their experience, strength and hope with each other that they may solve their common problem and help others to recover from chronic procrastination.
New Guy in Deep S***
Hello everyone!,
After reading so many of these posts I almost feel like I am related to half the people who are on this site. I am currently a mature ages student who, even as a mature aged student, is struggling with getting on with my work and now I am 4 weeks behind on 2 subjects of uni lectures, readings, assessments and assignments (currently still doing one that's overdue and have another major one due in 8 days!.
I am in a lot of trouble here and because of the anxiety and stress associated with the 'now' I am using escapism and procrastination to get away from it. I pretty much rebuilt my computer and cleaned my parents house, twice?!? along with a string of other unimportant non related bs when I should have been doing university work. I have a lot of medical issues and I use them as an excuse to not do most things and I can get extensions because of said medico issues but I hate to think it's because of these underlying medical issues I can't do something just like everyone else as I really don't think that is the case. I just have to work harder, and yet, I procrastinate???. My graduating year was meant to be this one and now I find myself stuck in second year for the first time studying full time and I really am in deep - 5 weeks till exams!.
Any suggestions on how to dig myself out of my own 'trainspottingesque' grave would be much appreciated. I am a perfectionist andI thinkI might have OCD - won't go near another person relationship wise until I know they're on the same ideological wavelenght and are STI, STD whatever the hell other diseases ccould be contracted/passed on to me.I am NOT elitist, I wish - could role up into a small ball inside my luxury appartment sipping on tea watching the stock market work in my favour. Did I forget to mention I've been diagnosed with innatentative add, no? my bad lol.
Seriously anyone who has experienced a similar situation and has then been able to dig themselves out successfully, would be really nice to hear from you right about now.
this site is great by the way, we should all get together and sit around a coffee shop for a day and annoy the patrons and staff but procrastinating en masse'.
regards, SStorminateacup
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twinsies
omg we must be related. i am so the same. from school... down to the dating/health ocd!
i really like the chatbox here. it helps me get momentum. i swear by my timer. try to find a nice timer that is visually appealing and has a non-irritating sound. when my timer goes off, i feel good that i have done something rather than nothing... no matter how small.
anyway, there is often one student or another in chat, and i find it very comforting to have chat on while i face the fear of starting my work. feels like i have a team behind me as i take small steps. sometimes just opening up ms word does wonders for me. each step i complete builds my confidence that there is some hope for me.
5/5
Welcome to the forum friend. I would spend 30 min on the forums here and realize there are other people out there with the exact same problems you have. Then stop. Break up your studying into very small tasks (read 10 pages in textbook X?) that you can do in 10-15 min and post a list on the daily check-ins. Do one task, take a break, do another, take a break, do another, etc... mark these tasks completed once you're done. I've found i'll eventually hit "the zone" where i'll stop taking breaks and just power through much of my work. But you gotta just get started any way possible. At the end of the day you'll look at your tasks and see wow I got through like 10 of them, and you'll feel content and motivated to do it all over again.
(S)
Welcome. Keep coming back. Give up your hobby of trainspotting and join us. PA, unlike the movie, gives a way out.
Hang in there
You can do it Storm. One foot in front of the other. Peace to you.
Welcome Storm
I know it's never too late to make a brand new start - from "Brand New Start" by Paul Weller
(((welcome storminateacup)))
Wanted to say welcome. And that there is hope in digging yourself out. But as I remember every day, it's not always easy or fun and it takes time but it's worth it.
tracy-la --(still digging herself out on a daily basis :)
How did you do it Tracy?.
How did you do it Tracy?. or should I say how are you foing?.
I give more time to the most unimportant things than I ever do to the things that are most important. I am broken, find me some glue.
((how to do it?))
It's a multi-faceted approach. And I think each person is different. So things need to be personalized somewhat for what works for one person may not work for another. I could write a book on all the things I've tried and experimented with over the past year.
But I am thinking of it as something I am exploring, that's it's about creating wonder in my life. A big help this year was being kinder to myself and not beating myself up to get myself to do it and staying positive (while not delusional).
We should chat about it. I use a lot of tips that are on this site and then implement other things.
For example, I realized I needed some external structure put in place since I am self-employed and I added that with some exercise classes, appointments, and other things to get me out of the house early.
One suggestion on goal setting was specifically geared to whether I use procrastination to beat myself down. In that case, it was recommended by a professional that I not implement punishments when I don't meet certain goals. Because I will be driven to do that anyway. Instead, I do rewards even when I get small things done and I have created a chart that allows me to track scores of things that I want to get done from health to work to family & my reward system lets me use my rewards for going on the Internet for a half hour, reading a pleasure book for 1/2 hour & when I do those things I am then guilt free.
But for some people that may not work. I am not always consistent with using the rewards but when I do -- I do better. So it's progress for sure.
You can find my email address on the site and shoot me an email if you ever want to chat or have an outreach call.
Warm regards,
by tracy-la
That sounds like a pretty
That sounds like a pretty good idea!,kind of like dangling a carrot and rather than scrap fighting yourself to get it you allow yourself a nibble every now and again instead of a full blown out gluttonous feast. I tent to get gluttonous with video games - could play them for days and I'm in my late 20's! so lame, really.
I will try and implement that. thanks.
I give more time to the most unimportant things than I ever do to the things that are most important. I am broken, find me some glue.
Hello Guys, Still
Hello Guys,
Still very much deep in it, I'm applying myself but due to the trip ups during semester I am going to have to apply for a special late withdrawl on one of my units. It sucks but it's the only way I believe sa I am too far behind in that unit to catch up if I then have any chance of catching up with the other units. My signature says it all... sigh. Time to get back to an assignment I have due tomorrow.. yes I have had to ask for an extension but it was based on truthful medical and personal grounds, I just hate asking for them.
Anyone else been way behind and was able to catch up?. Tell me how, advice so far has been great though. Thanks again Tracy.
I give more time to the most unimportant things than I ever do to the things that are most important. I am broken, find me some glue.
I am broken, too
Hi storm,
I have been in the same situation. Having to ask for medical/personal extensions is something I've had to do over and over and I never get over how humiliating it feels. I hate it.
But listen, YOU CAN catch up. It's hard. But if you get your footing and BEGIN to tackle the work, as soon as you get a handle on it, you will begin to progress steadily toward the completion.
I recently realized how much I feel, deeply, that I don't WANT to complete my school work. I have a lot of fears about being finished.
The one thing I can tell you is that, as painful and conflicted as I've been about completing my school work, once I got started, I realized it was a huge relief.
Please feel free to contact me if you need any help getting started. I'm happy to talk to you on the phone or have check-ins.
We are all broken, here. But, we all have experience, strength and hope to share with each other.
thanks Piet, I'm in
thanks Piet, I'm in Ausstralia so it might have to come down to a skype meeting haha. I should start using this as a check in thread.
Today and yesterday I sat down in front of my computer and WASTED the only opportunity I had to catch up significantly. I researched, researched, researched things which were over the top and unrequired of this assignment and I HATE IT, that I know I did this. I had jotted down a list on my whiteboard of all the things I wanted to do and I have not done one of them.. I had an emotional couple of days however (really hard to admit that as a bloke, even under the guise of anonymity). My mother is in my face with a ton of problems, my father is a biased religious fanatic who cannot see past the nose on his face so trying to talk with him is impossible and I have been having difficulties at work due to the fact I can't keep my educated mouth shut. Wish I could fain ignorance but my mouth has a mind of its own and refuses to hold the tongue when my ears hear the truth rarely spoken and stupidity overriding logic.
A wise man listens and rarely speaks, I need more wisdom.
I 'came' to the conclusion that if I want to get work done, I must remove myself from the home and go to university, where the computers are sh*t and the chairs are horrid (in comparison to my self skewed definition of reality, being an air conditioned room, great computer and access to an amazing virtual private library directly at my fingertips which I created to do work with AND YET I DO NOTHING)
I am very, very frustrated with myself right now.
Work to live - A cleaner at one of my old jobs who had suffered from Alcoholism, abuse and a long hard road said these 3 words as I left the premises of my previous employer for the very last time. He had heard I was leaving and we had a tendency to chat in the lunch room about his life and all the things he had done/should have done, both good and bad and visa versa - he was 50 and I was 27 and I had already exceeded his held position 3 fold I never thought less of him and I think that's why we were friends, I never looked down on him whilst others considered him a nuisance, he just wanted to talk.
Anyway I will one day get that statement tattooed on the left hand side of my back, but only once I have overcome this horrid self inflicted condition. I do not have many years left on this planet and I have wasted so many doing 'things' and I don't want to do 'things' anymore I want to do something that can make a positive difference in others lives and in due course hopefully better my own aswell. This is my meaning and purpose and yet I self sabotage the only real shot I have ever had at sculpting the one dream I have ever had worth anything into something real.
I give more time to the most unimportant things than I ever do to the things that are most important. I am broken, find me some glue.
p.s 3 weeks until exams...
p.s 3 weeks until exams... ohh god.
I give more time to the most unimportant things than I ever do to the things that are most important. I am broken, find me some glue.
I am a waste of
I am a waste of space
I give more time to the most unimportant things than I ever do to the things that are most important. I am broken, find me some glue.
hang in there storm!
You are in the right place to get help, and you're not the first to feel this way. As St. Paul said a couple thousand years ago:
15 For I do not understand my own actions. For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate.
Beauty is in the eye of the beholder, but it may be necessary from time to time to give a stupid or misinformed beholder a black eye - Miss Piggy
(Hi Storm!)
Hang in there!
I don't believe that any person is a waste of space, so you certainly are not. Please don't measure yourself solely by what you have achieved/not achieved - there is more to you than that.
Besides, we need more Australians on the forum - I am one too.
I guess things are hard for you with exams just around the corner.
Have you tried using the chat box here?
Also mrdeez suggestions on May 6th could help . . .
All the best. You are not alone with this problem.
(SC)
Good analogy of procratination, finding that "specific point" is helpful.
In 2009, while bending over to pet a friend’s dog, I felt “the twinge” and I
knew that it was only a matter of hours before I’d be immobile, so I drove home
and got into bed for what I knew would be a Trainspotting-esque
nightmare of pain. This time, I was laid up for three days, and on a softer
mattress, which resulted in me literally screaming in pain every time I tried
to roll onto my side.
Oddly enough, I’m actually glad I had that last horrendous strain,
because that time I figured out exactly what kind of movement had caused it.
The first time was a surprise, and I wasn’t entirely sure what I’d done, so my
reaction was to not do anything strenuous for as long as I could. But when I
realized I could be felled simply by petting a dog, I realized my “prevention”
was misguided — my problem wasn’t physical stress in general, but the
specific point at which the physical stress was being placed on my back.
Thanks for the kind words,
Thanks for the kind words, just got to get on with it. I have an exam today and I have already passed the unit (pretty much) though tomorrow I fear the exam which I have leading to me avoidance of the topics at hand (seriously maladaptive coping mechanisms are the worse).
I was just at a real low point when I said I was a waste of space, it seems like everyone around me is overtaking and I feel very much left behind. My goals aren't insane nor impossible and yet they feel that way.
I'll have a look over this thread after my exams are complete. think I should start a 'check in' thread, might help.
I give more time to the most unimportant things than I ever do to the things that are most important. I am broken, find me some glue.