Only Geniuses Procrastinate

Here's why procrastination could make you the next Einstein

If you are reading this there is a high chance you are meant to be doing something else right now and you have been scrolling through medium and ended up here. I would not blame you, why do some short task set by your boss now when you could do it later. I am exactly the same while writing this I am currently at work and have a report due in by the end of the week.

Why do we procrastinate:

Although, many people coin procrastinators as lazy or uninterested it is a lot more complex than that. In actual fact, different fields of psychology all have different terms for Procrastination.

Social psychologists believe its a form of emotional regulation and we procrastinate to avoid feeling bad e.g stress.

Evolutionary psychologists believe it to be partly down to genetics.

As much as I hate to believe it may be in my genes when you think about it, it does make some sense.

Picture this throughout the ages our ancestors have always though about short term goals such as gathering food, they didn't have time to think about next month when they are busy worrying about dinner today. Therefore, in order to survive, they had to put off the long term or the unimportant life and death decisions. These decisions helped them survive as they prioritized short term survival these behavioral traits may have been passed down there, kids.

However nowadays in the age of globalization and skyscrapers. We all must know what we want do to by college or start saving for retirement as soon as possible because we have the luxury of living in a sheltered society where we only have to really worry about our long term goals. Therefore, the short term time management behavioral trait that some of us may have in our genes is no longer as useful as it used to be.

That may be one reason why many of us leave the tasks that aren't due soon for later and end up doing them last minute. So although many argue nowadays that it is our own fault and we are just lazy, just explain to them it is out of your hands and it was passed down.

But in reality, don't tell your boss that although some scientists do argue it's genetic there are many other external factors that are affecting your decisions and why you procrastinate such as a study suggesting we put things off depending on how it makes us feel. This theory states that if a task stresses us out then in order to avoid the negative feeling we put off the task and as we now feel emotionally better we are psychologically tricking ourselves into thinking we have just made a great decision.

Why it is a genius technique:

Ok, so why do I go against the countless scientific studies and youtube videos that say we should stop procrastinating. The main reason is that it hurts us.

Procrastination hurts your job, it hurts your income, it hurts your relationships and it hurts your general well being.

The same way your brain sends alerts around the body when something causes you pain physically, the psychological pain caused by procrastination sends an important alert around your body that acts as a wake-up call.

Over time, you should develop a natural reflex, so whenever you think of putting off that assignment you will shudder remembering what happened last time you did such a thing. This psychological trick can help you get ahead of the competition in almost anything in life. Your co-workers who are always used to handing things in on time will break down at the first sign of 10 assignments due tomorrow but you with your vast experience of late submissions and coupled with your psychological reflexes caused will be able to outcompete the competition.

So the next time people tell you, you are lazy or have no motivation just remember in the long run this self-destruction will help make you better in all aspects of life it is as they say.

Without immense pressure diamonds cant be formed!