When I was young, I pretended that this was innovation rather than procrastination. Of course, as I got older I saw that the only time I really felt like working on that story or fixing that frame or reupholstering that chair was when something else I didn't really want to do needed to be done. Fifteen minutes into cleaning their rooms, my children started coming up with great ideas.
Maybe we should build a bookcase. Maybe we should sew up this teddy bear. Maybe we could turn this wagon into a sailboat (brilliant idea, tiny heathen).
Just put the toys. in the toy box. It's so simple. Just do it.
'Where does this go? *holds up broken handle of something*'
It's trash. Put it where trash goes. Identify the object and then place the object where it goes. Repeat.
I hear myself saying this and I remember my dad saying the same thing. "I shouldn't have to stand over you and tell you what you should be doing!"
I don't know why it's so hard to get things done. Maybe if I tell them all that their chores are to make sailboats out of their toys, they'll decide they should clean their rooms instead.
Oh my god I totally do that. The one way to get myself to buckle down and do something unpleasant is to have to do something worse. Or -- okay, two things. Or do it really fast when I'm still coasting on the momentum of something else I just did. I get a lot more done when I'm super busy than when I've got actual time to do that stuff. Of course, mundane shit is much more upsetting when I'm busy, and I've been known to cut the eyes out of terrorist ninjas all week and then cry because I don't have any clean underwear.
ReplyDeleteI dare the universe to make me fail, waiting til the very last minute and then whipping something out. Unfortunately, it seems that that is when I do my best work, so the universe just keeps letting me be lazy. :/
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