Procrastination Is Like Masturbation*
[ Comments Off ]Posted on October 3, 2009 by admin in Lifestyle & Culture
Saturday, October 3rd, 2009It feels fine while you’re doing it, but in the end you realize you just effed yourself.
Help. I’ve recently become the person I detest: a Procrastinator. Generally, I’m one of the more organized, productive, and on-schedule people you’ll meet. I like feeling peaceful, and I feel peaceful when things are complete and in order. Feeling on top of things also keeps one ready to accept new opportunities, and to me, that’s what life is all about. New experience, learning, and growth. So how, oh how and why did this happen to me? Well, as a friend pointed out recently, when it comes to procrastination, “why” is over-rated. The fact is, the problem is immediately solved by simply DOING things. Duh. But if you’re having trouble getting out of the weeds, it might help to know why. This Psychology Today piece explains a lot of things about procrastinators, including the three basic types: “Arousal Types”, who wait ’til the last minute for the euphoric rush. “Avoider Types”, who may be avoiding fear of failure or even fear of success, and “Decisional Types”, who avoid making a decision to absolve themselves of responsibility for the outcome. I in fact have had a more neurotic version recently, which combines the Arousal and Avoider types with social/media overload and a devious unconscious plot to undermine my self-esteem. I know better than to excessively try to multitask (check out this NPR piece if you think you’re good at it), but it’s almost unavoidable with today’s prevalence of texting, voice phones, Facebook, e-mail, and real life. One thing I didn’t know though, was that multitasking is actually muddling and generally wrecking our brains. Also worthy of note is that strangely, Read the rest of this entry »
Do You Occupy More Space Than You Need?
[ 1 Comment ]Posted on September 6, 2009 by admin in Lifestyle & Culture
Sunday, September 6th, 2009Maybe it’s time to downsize. Because as Bernie Madoff can tell you, if you’re obsessed with living large, you can indeed end up in the big house.
Do you take up more space than you need? I’ve always lived a fairly simple life, but some missteps in the last year forced me to really downsize, and at the end of it all, frankly, I was happier. One thing I noticed as I shed a lot of belongings was that I had only kept many of them simply because I had a place to put them. Another thing I noticed was that with every box of knickknacks or piece of extra furniture I let go of, a place seemed to lighten up in my head. I had a palpable feeling of liberation, which got me thinking about all of my values. That little house info-graphic lower on the page shows how much more space we all occupy today as compared to 50 years ago. Do we need that extra space? An obsessive longing for wealth and a big house can, as Bernie Madoff can tell you, lead to a life in the big house . And a life fueled by consumption of goods, in my opinion, also leads to people’s actual bodies taking up more space than they should. To me, the debate about higher airfares for obese people is a no-brainer. Sure. Charge more for heavy people. And less for skinny people. In fact, do it by the pound; that’s how they charge for other shipping, and especially with today’s quality of service on airlines, that’s all they’re doing is shipping people, right? If you have a problem with this, consider donating some of your fat for fuel. Maybe they’ll give you a credit for reducing your “Carbon Fatprint”. But I digress. Simplifying your life is gratifying, and easier than you think. There are hundreds of books out there