Or, An Embarrassing Exposé on Procrastination and Routines

 

It has taken me a very, very, very long time to sit down and open up this Word document. Like, you don’t even want to know. I came up with the idea of starting a blog ages ago and then proceeded to never, ever do it. In fact, this single uncompleted item has been guilting me from a note on my phone for months until I finally faced the facts that I would never do it and then deleted it. But today, for some reason I cannot fully comprehend, I have sat down and begun.

So, you may be wondering, what is the point of this post? What sage wisdom will I impart on you from my noble and enlightened position in this IKEA desk chair? Nothing that good, I’m afraid. Except, perhaps, a warning, and hopefully the ability to use the written word to work out this issue I am faced with for myself so that I might offer you some shred of advice that is worthy of your time. Yes, I am aware that time is quickly running out for me to proffer said wisdom (I’m a procrastinator, and I have no idea where this post is headed; let me buy some time).

Basically, I was inspired to finally start writing because I have become downright sick and tired of doing nothing, of being stuck at the bottom of a very deep pit that I have dug myself into day-in and day-out via a million small, insignificant (or so they seemed) decisions that eventually turned into habits that eventually became a big, fat rut. And I guess I thought that if I wrote about my experiences and shared them with the wide world of the internet, maybe some other poor freelancer out there would find it and think, “Same,” and therefore my misery would finally have some company. No, that’s a joke (partially), I just hope that my words can work their usual magic and yank me out of the funk of my anxiety-clouded brain so that I can sort out my own ish.

So, the point. I am a freelance editor and proofreader. That means that other people send me stuff that they write and then I take it and make it legible. And people actually give me money to do this. The catch is that I have the freedom to set my own schedule and do all this work from the comfort of my own bed, if I so choose (although I finally upgraded to a desk chair, and, honestly, best decision I have made yet, career-wise). This probably sounds wonderful. And it is! No annoying coworkers or overbearing bosses breathing down your neck (well, usually), no commuting, no fancy clothes or forgetting to bring your lunch or worrying about whether you can get away with calling in sick. What could be bad about this setup?!

I’ll tell you: it’s you. Or in my case, me. I am my own worst enemy, because even though I put in all the hard work and sweat and tears and sleepless nights to get my degree and get experience and get clients and all the difficult stuff, I forgot one important thing: to learn how to hold myself accountable. You see, my whole life, and probably yours, too, if you are an average American, I have always had someone else around to hold me accountable and make sure I do whatever it is I’ve got to do. From elementary to high school I had teachers expecting my homework assignments, and then in college I had professors ready to pencil in my exam grades, and in my early minimum-wage and entry-level jobs I had coworkers and bosses telling me to do this and do that and have it done by this time, and so on. But now, there is only one person I have to worry about and only one person I have to listen to: me.

Unfortunately, I am the literal worst boss in the world. I may seem fun on the outside: I let myself take a lunch whenever I want, let myself keep my phone on me, let myself sleep in and take as many breaks as I feel like. But guess what? Nothing Gets Done! With all of the comforts of home just within reach, including a very comfy bed and a couple pups that really enjoy cuddling, I have come to find it nearly impossible to tear myself away, open my laptop, and get going. I want to, believe me I do, but there is some mental block I have developed that always whispers, “Just one more Markiplier video, just ten more minutes on Tumblr,” and I am powerless to resist.

So what’s really the culprit here? I have yet to determine exactly for myself, but I suspect there are a few factors at play: self-esteem, professional value, under-stimulation, social media addiction, depression, anxiety, executive dysfunction, just plain-old lack of self-discipline; the list goes on. Any one or several of these could be contributing to my blatant inability to get down and get to work. So now the question arises: What to do about it?

As much as I find BuJo and calendars and planners to be so cute and aesthetic, I must publicly admit that I am the WORST planner in the history of planning. I cannot begin to tell you how many cute planners and calendars and unnecessary art supplies I have purchased to try to persuade myself to set a routine AND THEN STICK TO IT. So, I guess I should rephrase: I am an excellent planner and an atrocious follow-througher. One simple, small, insignificant thing will throw me right off of any schedule I write, and once I fall off that horse, there is no getting back on. It’s gone, far away into the sunset.

So the logical approach to this is to take baby steps, right? Yes, I am right, as far as experts are concerned anyway. I have read many, many, many articles and watched many, many, many videos from people who claim to have hacked their way into a daily routine. Their approaches vary slightly, but the main consensus is to “find a routine that works for you!” As I write this, I think I am coming to the conclusion that literally no routine works for me. At least, not where my life stands right now. Things are inconstant and ever-changing; this is a fact of life for most freelancers. You never really know when work is going to come, and every project has different deadlines and expectations, and then you throw other people’s schedules and personal appointments and the daily errands and necessities of having any life beyond your job into the mix, and then by this point there is no way, No Way, that you can write a consistent schedule and then stick to it every single day. It’s Just Not Going To Happen! Especially if, like me, you have zero self-discipline (which, to be honest, is probably my single biggest problem).

So where does this leave us? I have detailed all the reasons why I am having a hard time and why having a routine is just not possible—not for people like us. But what do we do about it? We have commiserated long enough, elicited enough “Same”s, and have displayed our incompetence proudly for the world.

Now, it is time for the answer. So here is mine: Give yourself the freedom to exercise your freedom. Within Reason. I add this disclaimer because if you decide that you don’t give a shit about paying your rent or mortgage and are just going to take an unplanned vacation to Europe instead, you will be homeless, and I don’t want any of you to come back and comment on my blog post saying that I am the reason you are now homeless.

What I mean is to let go of the aesthetics and the expectations and what you perceive as being “correct,” and do things your own way. Maybe you wake up tomorrow and find that it is an irresistibly lovely morning and you simply must go out for a walk down to your favorite coffee shop for breakfast, so you decide that you’ll start work later in the afternoon. That’s fine! Maybe the next day you’ll find yourself infuriatingly awake at 4 a.m. and decide, “Screw it! I’ll just get some work done now.” Perfect! You do you! Your days don’t have to be symmetrical and perfectly planned to a T, because humans are neither symmetrical nor perfectly planned! Life is unexpected, and unless you are a robot/android/alternate form of artificial intelligence, your thoughts, feelings, desires, and motivations also change from day to day.

I am a procrastinator. I am a very good procrastinator, probably the best I know. You know why? Because for some godawful reason I am incredibly, intensely motivated by pressure. If I have two weeks to write a paper I will do it the night before, and it will be the best damn paper the teacher has ever seen. For me, nothing spurs quality quite like a tight deadline. And it’s been really hard, because society in general disproves of this (understandably so), but I am finally recognizing that this is what works for me. It may not be pretty or aesthetic or fit very nicely into a BuJo notebook, but it works, and as long as you do whatever works for you, accept it, and stop judging yourself and your habits based on other people’s expectations, then I think you, too, will find the motivation you need to get to work.

 

And if this doesn’t motivate, inspire, or resonate with you, then maybe you should be kind to your soul and quit freelance life because, damn, it’s hard as heck, and I contemplate getting a “regular” job again pretty much every day, and that’s A-OK, too.