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.

Do you believe in recurring tasks?

22 August, 2012 - 3:07pm - elvira

Does anybody else have the same problem I have, of grasping the concept of recurring tasks? Other people laugh & think I'm joking when I try and tell them, but I wonder if it's a common difficulty for procrastinators?

What I mean is that  when I do a job, I expect it to stay done, even though in the nature of it this is impossible. Even after 40 years of owning a motor vehicle, it still takes me by surprise that I keep needing to fill it up with fuel, and the same applies to doing the washing up, weeding the garden, getting a dental check-up, hoovering the living-room ... almost anything you have to keep doing.

Somehow when I've done one of these, my brain ticks it off as 'done' and deletes the instruction, so when suddenly my car grinds to a halt or there are no clean plates, I just can't understand it, because I know I've done that job. :-?

 

Is it just me? 

‹ Hello from newbie 'Somu' in the UK Introduction from an overeducated underachiever ›

recurring tasks are BORING!!

pro - 3 Sep 2012 - 12:08am

I can relate to this! I think part of the problem for me is that recurring tasks are so boring! I've done that already. I like new challenges. Tongue out

Re: recurring tasks (@ elvira)

movingalong - 2 Sep 2012 - 10:45pm

It's not just you!

For me, Yeah.  This happens all the time.

But I just cleaned my bathroom last month!  Wow it gets dirty again?  Oh!

But I just paid the electric bill two months ago! Why do I have to pay it again? Oh right.

But I drank eight glasses of water yesterday!  Why am I thirsty today? Do I have to drink water every day?

However, for me, the reason is a bit different.

For me, this is because I'm a procrastinator, and even the tiniest task seems like a huge ordeal. The ordeal of trying to do it but failing.  The ordeal of finally starting but then giving up and then having to re-start.  The ordeal of going through all the parts of the task, and getting distracted and then re-focusing.  The ordeal of finally getting it done.

So then when I finally do it, I feel like I've climbed a mountain.  I feel like I've conquered it and will never have to do it again.

Meanwhile, "normal" people just accept that they have to do these tasks regularly and expect to do so.  More importantly, they work through any resistance and get the task done before the resistance snowballs.  The tasks remain minor tasks.

Normal people don't make everything into a huge ordeal the way I do.

Somewhat elvira

Vientir - 22 Aug 2012 - 9:50pm

  I don't forget about these recurring tasks but I get very fed up with them. Doing the dishes, paying the bills, doing car maintenance: they create a sinking feeling of fatalism every time I must do them. 

- "A procrastinator's work is never done."

Love the expression of

studentessa - 30 Aug 2012 - 4:48am
Love the expression of "sinking feeling of fatalism", because its exactly what I get everytime I have to do the dishes. 
I find that these things get easier if you do them at a certain set time time in your schedule. Like every week, or every day at a certain time. The first few times you have to force yourself to, but hey, it takes about 40 days to create a habit, but then it starts to come naturally. Especially if you break it up into tiny tasks and combine it with something more fun. For example, I hate doing the dishes more than any other chore. But it has become easier when its not a huge pile that takes an hour to do, but I wash all of the dishes I have used after I am done eating. So that would be one cup, one plate, one knife at breakfast and thats not so bad and is done in minutes. I also like to put music on and make a dance party of it, especially with longer chores like cleaning the bathroom, which is scheduled every Saturday morning.
 
I think it also helps to push the thought of  "my god, I will be doing this every. single. day. till the day I die, which might well be another x years" away. its ten minutes, nothing more. It keeps the fatalism at bay. Tongue out
 
And if you forgot something or procrastinated on it and it becomes a bigger, unscheduled and annoying task tell yourself that its just this time. Things happen, not reason to fret on them, just get it over with and then it will be on schedule again. 
 
 
You cannot run away from a weakness; you must sometimes fight it out or
perish. And if that be so, why not now, and where you stand?
Robert Louis Stevenson (1850 - 1894)

No schedule

skinnerinside - 3 Sep 2012 - 5:13am

I think you've hit the nail on the head, Studentessa. I hate (hate HATE!) recurring tasks like cleaning the house, or even just keeping it tidy (like putting a single thing away in its correct place) as it seems like an unnecessary effort and I'm bad at multitasking... "it'll be more efficient to wait til there's more mess and do it all at once", I think...  

 

When the "all at once" time comes it's all snowballed into a massive tedious task which puts me off the idea of doing it in future. Now, after multiple couple of rounds of tidying up the whole house, scraping at least a month's worth of dust off every flat surface in the entire place in one go, hoovering everywhere, cleaning the bathroom, kitchen, toilets... I've taught myself that cleaning is a horrific task . If only I had done it one room at a time on a more regular basis it might not have been!