Man On Twitter Illustrates How Bad The Consequences Of Procrastination Are With His Broken-Window Story
Putting off important tasks might ruin the activity one does instead of it. The nagging thought of “I should be doing it right now” might prevent one from being present for those other activities and cause regrets.
Nathan Howe described how he learned his lesson about postponing things in a Twitter thread. Bored Panda did an interview with psychology professor Joseph Ferrari who is one of the rare academic experts on chronic procrastination. He even authored a book about this self-sabotaging lifestyle called “Still Procrastinating?: The No Regrets Guide to Getting It Done“.
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Postponing a task can cause a lot of avoidable distress
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Joseph Ferrari says that chronic procrastinators do it in several aspects of their lives and it negatively impacts them. Thus, it should not be confused for delaying, as you can delay in order to prioritize. Procrastination is not indecisiveness either. Procrastinators do one thing in order to avoid doing the other e.g. cleaning instead of applying for jobs, but indecisive people often don’t do anything at all because they can’t decide on what or how. Many procrastinators put off finishing things indefinitely out of fear they will be judged for lack of skill and preferring they are judged for lack of effort.
Nathan Howe decided to share his teaching moment about postponing things with his window-fixing experience
Image credits: natehowe
Image credits: natehowe
The professor does not consider himself a procrastinator. As he puts it: “Life’s too short. There’s too much to do. Why are you delaying? Why are you postponing the joy in life?” However, he does get approached by students interested in following in his footsteps, then he asks them if they are procrastinators, which he guesses is often the case “because there’s a concept: research is me-search.” Meaning, people choose areas of study so they can learn more about themselves.
Image credits: natehowe
Indefinitely postponing the task felt unpleasant for Nathan
Image credits: natehowe
Prof. Ferrari mentioned 3 myths about procrastination. No 1. Technology makes you procrastinate. “There was a time you had to get your horse and your buggy together and you’d ride down to go see your neighbor seven miles down the road. Then you had this thing called the automobile. You can wait to the last minute to go.” He claims this is not really procrastination – it’s efficiency, and technology does not make people procrastinate, it’s on them how they use it and abuse it.
Nathan’s motivation to finally fix the windows was external
Image credits: natehowe
He chose to do it cheaply rather than having it never done
Image credits: natehowe
Myth No. 2 people are busier today, we have more to do. Prof. Ferrari thinks this is simply an insult to our ancestors “who were farmers who had to get up in the morning and make sure the fields were plowed, and the fence was fixed, the animal feed was filled, and the well was working, then pin the goods.” He suggests you learn to manage yourself better since you cannot manage time and what you do with your time, with your 168 hours a week. He accentuates that you cannot control what life presents you with, but you can control how you choose to deal with it.
He then looked into his window problem with the newly-gained wisdom
Image credits: natehowe
Image credits: natehowe
Which applies to many things in life
Image credits: natehowe
Myth No. 3 I work best under pressure. This was denied by experiments that Prof. Ferrari and his peers did. They found that procrastinators took longer and made more errors, but thought the opposite. He says there is a lot of misperception, but in actuality “people who are procrastinating are not lazy. They work very hard at not doing what they’re supposed to do.”
Image credits: natehowe
At the end of the day, Nathan suggests you acknowledge the present moment and don’t eat yourself up for past mistakes
Image credits: natehowe
Prof. Ferrari and his peers found in every society they investigated that about 20% of its population are chronic procrastinators, regardless of sex or culture. This lifestyle is related to high levels of self-awareness, depression, neurosis, social anxiety, disorganization, noncompetitiveness, etc. The professor did observe a causal link between cold and demanding fathers and children who grow up to be procrastinators. These children are left with only one way of rebellion – to procrastinate.
People responded positively to Nathan’s story sharing their own moments of learning the same lesson
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Image credits: rpgraphicdesign
Procrastination does negatively impact peoples’ health. As Dr. Fuschia Sirois found in 2003, procrastination in emerging adults is related to high levels of stress, colds, flu, headaches, stomach problems, etc. She also found that people who do it chronically are hard on themselves when they fail and that negative self-critical thinking takes a toll on their health. Procrastination in people with hypertension and cardiovascular diseases had a stronger association with maladaptive coping behavior, than in healthy people. To sum up: chronic procrastination can provoke health problems.
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Image credits: gnome_chris
Prof. J. Ferrari gives some words of hope as long as one is motivated from within. “Like most clinical disorders, the first step to recovery from chronic procrastination is a desire to break the cycle. After surmounting this initial obstacle, these individuals can start living the life they have wanted to live, but have been putting off for too long.”
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Honestly i saw it when uploaded, i saved it and I'm reading it just now! 😅😅
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If it doesn't move and it should or it makes noise and it shouldn't, WD-40. If it moves and it shouldn't, Duct tape. Life is simple!
Raise your hand if you have ever been personally victimized by Nathan Howe.
OK but the procrastination isn't the issue here. The mental health parable isn't the issue here. The issue is this: he originally didn't fix the window because they couldn't afford it. He left it for 5 years because they couldn't afford it. A rich person would have called someone immediately, because a rich person can do that.
He also listened to others before trying it on his own and figuring out that he COULD afford it. So, while a rich person would have not even had an issue and I agree with you that this is a money problem, he still allowed the stress of the situation control the narrative instead of finding another way.
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ironically we have 2 cracked windows right now, one cracked 5 years ago, the other last year, they are triple glazed and only 1 layer is cracked so i'm not gonna worry about it since it doesn't affect anything.
For someone who just put herself down for not getting up super early to work out, this was fantastic timing
Don't put yourself down. Enough people do that already! You're doing wonderfully in such a difficult world!
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In a billing control office I learned that a problem discovered before bill render took $5 to fix. $10 during bill render, and $15 after the fact. I try to apply that in other areas.
There have been so many things over the years that have happened to me like this. To the point when my wife and I have sort of a running joke about it. Broken light fixture? Let it annoy you for 5 years, then fix it in 10 minutes. We've currently reached the point at which neither of us want to deal with it, and have hired a company to come in and just fix all of the little sh*t that annoys us. We're fortunate to have the ability to do that, but it's amazing how many times over the years we were able to quickly fix something that had been driving us nuts for a long time.
I needed to hear this as it validated my ADHD dilemmas and gives me hope! Thanks for analysis paralysis!
I think it was a reason to why he didn't spend the money to have it fixed, not for sympathy.
Load More Replies... Honestly i saw it when uploaded, i saved it and I'm reading it just now! 😅😅
Load More Replies... If it doesn't move and it should or it makes noise and it shouldn't, WD-40. If it moves and it shouldn't, Duct tape. Life is simple!
Raise your hand if you have ever been personally victimized by Nathan Howe.
OK but the procrastination isn't the issue here. The mental health parable isn't the issue here. The issue is this: he originally didn't fix the window because they couldn't afford it. He left it for 5 years because they couldn't afford it. A rich person would have called someone immediately, because a rich person can do that.
He also listened to others before trying it on his own and figuring out that he COULD afford it. So, while a rich person would have not even had an issue and I agree with you that this is a money problem, he still allowed the stress of the situation control the narrative instead of finding another way.
Load More Replies... ironically we have 2 cracked windows right now, one cracked 5 years ago, the other last year, they are triple glazed and only 1 layer is cracked so i'm not gonna worry about it since it doesn't affect anything.
For someone who just put herself down for not getting up super early to work out, this was fantastic timing
Don't put yourself down. Enough people do that already! You're doing wonderfully in such a difficult world!
Load More Replies... In a billing control office I learned that a problem discovered before bill render took $5 to fix. $10 during bill render, and $15 after the fact. I try to apply that in other areas.
There have been so many things over the years that have happened to me like this. To the point when my wife and I have sort of a running joke about it. Broken light fixture? Let it annoy you for 5 years, then fix it in 10 minutes. We've currently reached the point at which neither of us want to deal with it, and have hired a company to come in and just fix all of the little sh*t that annoys us. We're fortunate to have the ability to do that, but it's amazing how many times over the years we were able to quickly fix something that had been driving us nuts for a long time.
I needed to hear this as it validated my ADHD dilemmas and gives me hope! Thanks for analysis paralysis!
I think it was a reason to why he didn't spend the money to have it fixed, not for sympathy.
Load More Replies...
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