Have You Ever Procrastinated On Something?

Procrastination. The moment anyone hears of that word, it brings a negative connotation about it, most of the time. Procrastination means only negative? Is procrastination that bad? Could it be beneficial at all?

This article intends to throw some light on how sometimes procrastination can be beneficial as well.

Let's see how.

Creativity and Imagination

Our creative pursuits generally need more time. Some things demand more imagination time. Our creativity gets better in time pressure scenarios, but some things warrant us to be thoughtful in our creativity and imagination. That means we need additional time.

For example, consider someone writing a fiction novel. Would it need more imagination, creativity, and deep thinking to draw characters, events, scenarios, emotions in the story? Could we get all that in a compressed timeline? Maybe or may not. Mostly it would work out the best if it gets accomplished by giving it an appropriate window of time.

Does it mean we procrastinate purposefully? Do we pointlessly kill time? No. It just means that we keep our thinking and imagination going, but we should be in that mode until we get a rewarding outcome to our satisfaction. The feeling that we have done our best.

Prioritization and Value

In the world of competing priorities that we deal with, it is imminent that we work on things that are most valuable to us, even if it means spending a little additional time.

It is about doing too many small things that are of lesser value vs. doing very few sizeable things of higher value. Individuals may decide based on their preferences and choices. If you are into the latter category, you may need to take the time to get the value. It means active procrastination in light of value. We consciously take that additional time to get the intended value.

Consider I am writing a non-fiction book on a subject. I may use that additional time gathering facts, insights, knowledge, and wisdom to provide the highest value to the readers. In that process, the book may become more engaging as well.

Deferring Commitment

One of the Lean Manufacturing principles is to defer commitment until the last moment to make critical decisions.

Sometimes our decisions are irreversible. In those scenarios, it would always be prudent to wait until the very last moment to have generated, reviewed, and evaluated all choices before making a firm decision.

For example, if I have more than one job offer and if I need to decide on one, I might take a much-needed window of time possible in making my decision to accept that one offer and reject the rest. My decision becomes irreversible in this case.

Final Thoughts:

It is bad only when you are in passive procrastination mode. It means you don't make any progress at all with what you have in your hand despite knowing the value of the same. But when you actively procrastinate for valuable and compelling reasons, it is good, and you can do that.

When I am injured, I can work actively or passively to recover from the injury. Passive recovery is more of rest, and it would take longer to heal from the injury. Active recovery is more of actively working to heal through swimming, yoga, or by other means.

You may have seen that, in our lives, we get solutions to our problems when we passively wait, but it cannot be guaranteed. Instead, if we look for solutions actively, we may find a logical and practical solution sooner. Probability would be better with the latter case.

You have both choices. Lean towards active procrastination as needed to your advantage, always!