Omega Forums is a community that I am proud to be a part of.

It is somewhere I like to enjoy reading, browsing and posting.

However, like all things, too much of a good thing is bad. Especially when it comes at the cost of other things.

I admit that I am definitely a procrastinator. I believe I spent time responding to a forum post and mentioned I needed to do university assignments. Those university assignments have not been touched and one is already very late for submission.

And for most of my life, I have been a procrastinator. And I believe that it comes from a lack of self-confidence. I did not pursue studies seriously at school. Inwardly I am not confident. I have been told 'fake it till you make it.'

When I was younger, the only thing that would make my father happy was if I got high marks. So I studied due to a reason. Once that 'dangling apple' was no longer there:

Instead of studying, I played games.
Instead of studying, I went to the gym.
Instead of studying, I gambled.
Instead of studying, I pursued love.

I am not in a relationship now. I stopped gambling when it just was not exciting. I continue gyming to this day. I continue playing games to this day.

I am not asking for any forgiveness in myself. Like all hobbies, watch collecting should be an enjoyable pursuit. It should not, as I myself have found, a quest for instant gratification.

What I have found is, when you go on the hunt for too long, and 'run away' from your priorities, it will bite you. Badly. You will get anxiety attacks. You will be constantly thinking about what you should be doing when you are at work. However when you get back home to work on them, you float towards - you got it - your hobbies.

It will eat at your finances as you use them as a cover and a refuge for something that is 'controllable' and takes relatively less pain to do than to study. When you have less money, things that you just can't afford will tempt you, yet when you had the money to buy them, you actually questioned yourself as to whether it was a worthy purchase or not.

When that workload just gets too much, you can either panic, and collapse in a heap, and continue to run away. You beat yourself up as you just look at that workload and wonder, is it achievable?

For five weeks of university I have not touched a single book. I have three assignments to hand in, one very late, a couple that will require some significant work. I choose to take a stand today and do as much as I humanly can.

I apologise if this has taken a bit of a sombre note. What I would like to do is to use this space as an area I can post the things I have done to remedy my priorities, even if they are small ones. I am sure if you have been a procrastinator you will be able to sympathize with some of the points.

Let's see what I can get done this evening!

 

I hear you mate. I'm quite the opposite, but i do procrastinate on things i DO NOT want to do... like admin work at work etc...

I stumbled upon a video on reddit recently and I have saved it.

Take a look and see if it works for you.

https://www.reddit.com/r/GetMotivated/comments/49rlwp/video1_hour_lecture_by_the_worlds_leading/

Tan

 

https://gofuckingdoit.com

 

Good luck.
Are you sure you are enrolled in the right course, something you actually want?

 

Thought-provoking post. Not least because I've just logged into OF when I really ought to be working instead..

In recent years I seem to have become more drawn to watches that are rarer / hard to find. This is partly down to me having the means to cast my net a little wider and also partly as I've explored brands and identified the kind of watches I like, but I do wonder how much of it is about the watches themselves and how much is about the thrill of the chase..

 

Thanks for sharing. I’ve gone through similar periods in my life and I have a suggestion for you that I really hope you take: go and talk to a professional, preferably a psychologist.

It’s fantastic that you’re in university, as every university I’m familiar with offers access to a psychologist for free, so further straining finances won’t be necessary.

The reasons I suggest this include:
- it will feel great to talk to someone, and to have a real person on your team helping you reach your goals and spend time strategizing with you on an ongoing basis;
- your issues with follow-through and procrastination may stem from a more macro psychological issue, like ADD or an anxiety condition - you ought to spend time with a professional for this reason. Finding out ways to deal with things that are challenges to you now will feel like a weight being lifted off of you; and,
- there’s zero downside in having a confidential conversation with a psychologist, particularly when it’ll likely be free for you as a student. It’s the equivalent of going to the gym for your brain.

I struggled for years to stay focused at work and get tasks completed. I went to see a psychologist and found out that I very clearly had adult ADD - I’d managed to piece together my own coping mechanisms in order to make my way through an Econ degree, a Law degree, some great jobs, etc., but I was getting increasingly frustrated that things were getting missed, I was avoiding finishing tasks, etc. I spent time with a psychologist and developed strategies over time that have significantly improved my life and reduced my anxiety from undone work - I still go on an ocassion because i frankly enjoy it and it’s a strategy session for me and my life.

It’s easy for many to just say “just go do it” - my wife is in an incredibly high level achiever with unwavering focus. But if you have some sort of underlying and undiagnosed condition, continuously kicking your own ass that you’re unable to just “go do it”’will simply make your issues worse. Your brain is a complex device - you can’t reason your way out of your biology.

A visit to a psychologist is highly recommended, I really encourage you to go.

 

This is pretty much what I was thinking. And I am a health professional myself.

 

Good on you for sharing, agree with the sentiment re getting professional assistance... worth figuring out of you really even want to study or is just a vestige of your early conditioning around it, or if you really do but need to get past the past stuff in order to be able to engage with it more readily.

 

Thanks for the post @GuiltyBoomerang. I'm guessing I'm a lot older than you but figure we're experiencing some similar situations. And thanks for your reply @sjg22 ; especially the "just go do it" paragraph.

I've been seeing a psychologist for five sessions now (plus a different one last year that didn't work for me) and kind of joked at the end of our last meeting that I might just be a procrastinator rather than having "a real issue". It's great to hear that procrastination is an actual genuine issue and even better that there's strategies to work on. I was close to giving up and figuring that I just had to "suck it up" and face that life is shit. Got a bit of hope right now

 

Wow ... brutally honest post and responses. All of the above and get yourself a “Gone Fishin” avatar. The hobby will still be there as will OF, home fires need tending. After a pretty upsetting professional setback I saw a therapist to help me cope with what he callled corporate anorexia work life balance and focus. It was very useful. My son has ADHD.. after raising him I see it in myself. Don’t be afraid to see a psychologist / neurologist about diagnosis and therapy. Myself I gave the last 12 years to a crazy global job, was sick a lot gained weight and now fighting Type 2. Grabbing the steering wheel back.

 

Remember the days when people kept a diary / journal and were pissed off if you read their private thoughts and problems? Now, people are pissed off if you don't read about their problems and give a "Like" as support.

I also remember the days that when somebody whined about their situation, we said things like "suck it up, buttercup" and "welcome to adulting". Now, that's derided as insensitive and possibly even bullying.

I'll stop there because, being one of those self-motivating types, I just don't understand how people let themselves slide into continual depression. Life is wonderful people! Yeah, some of the mundane tasks suck, but 3 minutes standing in the sunshine on a nice day can cure months of drudgery. As Cher's character in Moonstruck said "SNAP OUT OF IT!". It can be that simple if you let it.

 

I think its important to acknowledge that is superb that you have been blessed with excellent mental health while also letting you know that you are speaking from a position of a complete lack of understanding of the way depression works.

Personally I think its brave that guiltyboomerang has chosen to acknowledge something hes been struggling with... it is real, honest and authentic... it doesn’t require anyone to respond but its great that people have.

 

Imagine you wanted to get better at golf but had a terrrible swing.

Simply telling someone to just “snap out of it”, “go do it”, etc is going to be largely an exercise in futility.

There’s no denying that hard work will be needed in order to create real and lasting change - but in the same way that you need professional help to fix your swing in order to get better at golf, you often need professional help to fix your brain in order to get better at life.

Going and whacking balls endlessly with a flawed swing isn’t really gojng to make you better, just more frustrated. You need to first fix the underlying issues in order for practice and work to be effective.

The same applies here.

My $0.02 on your post...

 

Not true. Practice and hard work will improve your swing. It may take a long time, and professional help, and you may never reach top levels, but the only way YOU get better is if YOU want to. Again, personal choice - give up and stay mired in the muck, or lift yourself out of it no matter how much effort is required.

 

Charles Barkley has certainly benefited from your golf advice of “just keep endlessly hitting balls with your gawd-awful swing”.

There are clear studies that indicate that it’s not “practice” that makes you better (at anything), it’s “focused practice”. Contrary to your assertion, the evidence is that you will improve significantly faster if a golf pro improves your swing and you hit 1,000 buckets of balls than if you don’t get any assistance and further in-grain your bad habits by hitting 5,000 buckets of balls with zero instruction.

But why let the science get in the way. Brains aren’t a “one size fits all” part of your anatomy any more than feet - so while your approach will work for some, as hard as it may be to see from your perspective, it doesn’t work for all.

 

Hi @GuiltyBoomerang

By talking to other people about the problems you are experiencing you are beginning the process of been able to resolve those issues.
It sounds like this is something you have struggled with for some time and @sjg22 suggestion to seek professional advice, either through university counsellors or your GP, is an important step in understanding the underlying cause of these issues and then how to best address them.

It is sometimes thought that seeking help is a sign of weakness, and acts as a barrier for many, but it’s actually a sign you are ready to regain some control of the issues affecting your daily life.

 

Truth. People often say practice makes perfect, but in reality it's perfect practice that gives the benefit. Practicing bad habits only makes them tougher the correct. Trust me it's way harder to "unlearn" bad habits than it is to learn good ones.

Cheers, Al

 

@GuiltyBoomerang brave of you for openly speak out about this and your post Hit close to home for me.
Being in a somewhat comparable situation, I finally finshed my law studies after draging me through it because of lack of interest (that’s simplified and watered down, there where other factors to it but that’s the essence of it).

I can totally relate to the whole „putting of assignments“ until the last minute thing.

I‘d highly recommend you to check out Jordan Peterson’s work over on YouTube. He‘s a former Harvard psychology professor, now teaching at the univeristy of Toronto if i‘m not mistaken.
He touches on a lot of subjects you described in your post above.

Give his „Biblical series“ a try. Don’t be put of by the religious aspect of it (i‘m Not a very religious person my self) he‘s very neutral about it and the whole biblical stories aspect is more of a general frame than the main topic of his lectures.

I recommend this series by him because of the length of the individual events, allowing him to explain in a more detailed manner the subjects he sometimes only briefly touches in his other lectures.
Really thought provoking aspects, principles and ideas he talks about, made me rethink a lot of what I was doing for the past 10 years.

Here is a short snipped just to give you an insight:

And the biblical series if you have the time for it (I listen to this as if it is a podcast, there‘s no need to watch the video actually)

Have a nice day, and clean your room! (Don’t worry it‘ll make sense when you start listening to him . )

Cheers,

Max

 

To everyone who has posted,

Thank you all for your kind words.

To put it shortly, in the holy moly four hours that have gone to this point:

* I loaded my uni page.
* I loaded up my subject where the one assignment has been overdue.
* Thought nope, went to dinner.
* Proceeded to have dinner and then proceed through a ADHD online screen (and @sjg22, perhaps I am paranoid, I may be a combined, only a doctor/pysch can tell)
* Ordered two handmade straps from MWR for my WWWs based on @Syrte's experience

It was only in the last hour that I finally got round to writing what I did below. This is one of my (minimum) four blogs that I have to do for an art course (this assignment isn't due till next week.)

So I have been productive for 25% of my time. And it felt good to be in control and doing something! Not the most important thing, and not everything I wanted did get done, however:

Sleep is important too. I will take that for tonight.

Thank you and may blessings come down upon you all.