PRECRASTINATION IS A THING TOO!
The truth is, there is also a dark side to getting things done. In a world full of procrastinators, there are also obviously people who refuse to be bathed with the anxiety of finishing tasks just some hours before it’s due. They are called the precrastinator. So, should we all precrastinate for the sake of our time and well-being? Well, we guess not.
In 2014, David Rosenbaum, a psychologist from Pennsylvania State University, showed through his experiment that hyper-diligence is not a worthy trait to pursue. This might come off confusing as procrastination is a well-known unhealthy trait that occurs to many of us. So, logically speaking, getting tasks done as soon as possible would benefit us in so many ways. But turns out, it’s not. The opposite, precrastination can also be similarly unhealthy.
Precrastination is the tendency to complete or finish our tasks quickly just for the sake of getting things done sooner or later. As stated by Nick Wignall, it is a compulsion to work on new tasks immediately despite long-term costs and tradeoffs. You may think it is not much of a big deal, but it can be an inevitable trap, especially when we cannot distinguish what is truly important ahead of us. This can be seen in our daily lives. For instance, when we were doing our mathematics assignments, we got distracted by an email that pops in our notification, which then leads us to read and reply to that email. Then, we suddenly get reminded of that essay assignment from last week that could be finished if we just add several paragraphs. The next thing we remember is probably how we had not gotten back to our math assignments, and when we finally had the attempt to do it, we just lost our moment, felt so bad about ourselves for not finishing it right away, and chose to give the assignments up for the next day. And that’s how we are trapped in a vicious cycle of precrastination.
This tendency of working without even caring that it comes with extra costs is tricky. When the procrastinator delays important tasks too long, the precrastinator does not delay the unimportant tasks long enough. So, why does it happen? Why finishing tasks quickly can be so much of a problem?
Ironically, both procrastination and precrastination are caused by the same thing to alleviate any uncomfortable emotion. As we learned that whenever we are procrastinating, we are eliminating that anxiety, shame, or keeping the ‘moment’ we are currently in. Putting off our work until later is a great way to cope with those emotions, and so we procrastinate. And yes, this goes the same way with precrastinating. When we precrastinate, we are deciding based on what feels ‘good’ instead of what is ‘best’ in the long run. Both of them are caused by short-term, emotionally-driven decision making which comes at the expense of our ideals. However, there are also other common causes of precrastination, such as cheap satisfaction or the pleasure of accomplishing small tasks, our survival instinct which is to go for a ‘quick win’, and conscientiousness.
Now, as we learned that running miles to finish our tasks isn’t healthy either, how do we seriously work better? Some tips that we can give to fixate on this trait are to:
- Expand our awareness of how we work. Try to track how we work, and if precrastination feels like it started to creep in, tackle it!
- Energy-management. Most of us are taught that productivity is managing our time well, and although it is not wrong, managing our energy throughout the day to get our things done is equally important. This strategy can help us to realize how and when we should work on our tasks.
- Redefine our progress. It does sound counterintuitive, but slow down! Because doing our tasks by rushing does not mean we rush to the initial progress.
As you have learned about it, let’s find the balance between procrastination and precrastination. And chances are, we can function better as humans. We hope this article does not make you neglect the current task you are doing!
References
DeMelo, Juno. (2019). Precrastination: When the Early Bird Gets the Shaft. Extracted from New York Times: https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/25/smarter-living/precrastination-when-the-early-bird-gets-the-shaft.html
Desai, Rajvi. (2020). What Is Pre-crastination?. Extracted from The Swaddle: https://theswaddle.com/what-is-precrastination/
Rosenbaum, David A., & Edward A. Wasserman. (2015). Pre-Crastiantion: The Opposite of Procrastination. Extracted from Scientific American: https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/pre-crastination-the-opposite-of-procrastination/#
Wignall, Nick. (2019). Precrastination: The Dark Side of Getting Things Done. Extracted from: https://nickwignall.com/precrastination/