The Wages of Procrastination

CEBU, Philippines - Procrastination sometimes works - it can bring out the best in us. And what may, at one time, seem impossible can become workable if given some time. But is it wise?

We usually find ourselves caught in the crossfire of various concerns. Hectic tasks are like a volley of bullets that bring panic attacks. Especially when there's no way out and we can no longer hide, when target marks are right on our heads.

Pressure reigns. This daily warfare can push us to the edge of our sanity and capabilities, to the extremes, to uncharted terrains. It can also force us to go beyond the constructs of our self-imposed limitations. When our very survival is at stake, we are often able to conquer unexpected heights.

The corresponding adrenaline rush pumps us to our full capacity. It's like a devised, intentional hysteria. When we face up to life's challenges, we tap into the mental potential that we would not bother putting to work under more comfortable conditions.

Deadlines have become a performance-enhancing drug with us. It often goes with caffeine intake, as we find it to help make us more alive. While these "drugs" are legal and non-lethal, they still pose uncomfortable side-effects when they become an addiction. Simple dizziness, puking, even fainting, are common; many students even end up failing in the very subjects they do last-minute cramming for, or workers lose their jobs, and some momentarily lose their mind.

The mental pressure in beating deadlines is often camouflaged by a sense of thrill. Thus, we don't notice the toll it's taking on us. It's quite an adventure to try to test our limits, to see how long we can hold our breath and be reminded that we're lucky enough to be still breathing. Oh, how thrilled we are to imagine a gun constantly pointed to our head; it's only imagination anyway. Working on deadlines at the last minute puts us in a kind of trance wherein our energies boil and give us a natural "high."

Putting tasks off until the last minute tends to stimulate our dull existence. We find fun in suddenly being too busy with something; it makes us alive. It gives us some sense of purpose - and, of course, a sense of focus too, as we concentrate our efforts only on the task that's getting due.

It seems we procrastinate in order to prove that we can make miracles, which, as we have seen many times, we do. But it is self-torture too, and potentially harmful.

The cycle of tension and relief is addictive. It's masochistic to derive thrill from stress and pressure. It's like digging our own grave.

Our whole life experience is a series of deadlines. We know too well that at the end of all these little deadlines is the final one, which offers no corresponding relief or comeback. It will come in its own time; we don't have to make it sooner by subjecting ourselves to unnecessary anxieties.