Consider, too, our talents for procrastination (step six continued)
Consider, too, our talents for procrastination, which is really sloth in five syllables.
Oh this is me this is me this is me this is me! I have tortured myself with procrastination!
I see two sides to this. I know people who seem obsessive about getting things done that must be done, and they do it at the earliest possible second, obsessively. They can seem a bit frantic to me. Just now, trying to imagine what that is like, I’m wondering if there’s a time each day when they have done all they can do - paid bills, done their work (whatever kind of homework that may entail), cleaned what was to be clean.
And writing that, I realize that the people I know fairly well who fall into this category are truly not usually on time or ahead with everything. As I was just writing, my wife asked me if I had heard back from my cousin via email. He emailed me several days ago with a political position that was disturbing to us, and I had said to her that I was going to try to gently lead him in the way (we think) he should go. So she just asked me if I’ve heard back from but actually, I haven’t replied to his email in order for me to hear back. If I replied to all my email the day I got it, or the next day, how would that work?
But well I got derailed pretty well with that! I put off what I don’t want to face. I hate the mail, I hate paying bills, I hate shopping, and I will put all of these off until past the last possible minute. In the house we lived in prior to this one, I had the dining room table FILLED with papers from the mail. Now to be fair, I was often taking care of the paper of three people - myself and my two kids. But I would put off touching the stuff until a few times a year we needed the table, then I’d see that I hadn’t needed this or that paper in all that time. I should say I’m not ever late paying bills, I wouldn’t do that. But I’m actually years late in contacting my prepaid legal lawyer to see what’s become of my inheritance, and years late taking my piddly retirement accounts (three!) from my previous job and combining with my current one.
I have made progress. I haven’t destroyed the dining room table in this house with mountains of paper. And …… that may be about it!
I believe it comes up later in the step (and when I wrote this line, I saw with alarm that I am approaching the end of the step, having solved nothing), but of course I could work more diligently on this defect and others like it if I had motivation. I have made some progress in the program with things like this, but not enough.
