Procrastination

I'm writing this instead of an English essay. The irony is almost heart breaking.

Unfamiliar with the term 'procrastination'? Below is a video I was shown by a friend last week about said term. Its accuracy has moved me in a deeply emotional way. John Kelly speaks the truth.





Procrastination is a subject that has haunted me my whole life, but has become significantly worse and subsequently scarier in the past 2 years, including a noticeably giant increase in influence this academic year. When I say 'my whole life' I mean that I have always struggled with concentration and time management. Every single one of my school reports from primary school contains the phrase 'Rosemary is showing great potential, but I wish she could work a little faster' (or similar) printed in harsh black ink.  But with the coming of age, also naturally comes a development in this work style. Nowadays I'm not just a slow worker, bumbling along for a little bit longer than everyone else, or a distracted daydreamer that sometimes struggles to apply themself academically. Nowadays I am all those things as well as being addicted to the internet, passionate about sleeping, and being constantly unsure about quite what it is I'm supposed to be doing exactly. I have said previously that my procrastination habits are becoming increasingly worse. This is evident, for example, in the fact that I have mountains (not a metaphor!) of work to do at the moment, but despite having 7 hours available today, I have nothing but a rephrased essay question (rephrased for the 15th time this week) to show for it. And this, tragically, is not an isolated case. This happens every single day for me. Without fail. I honestly cannot think of an exception to this within the last 6 months.

For anyone reading this that does not experience these moments of severe unproductiveness (that's-not-a-word-alert) every single day of their life, then it's probably easy to assume that I am lazy, unmotivated and stuck in bad habits ............................................................. and you're probably right. But one thing I would just like to make abundantly clear about this problem is that I do have ambitions. And I do care about my work. I want to study Drama at University and I want to work in the Theatre and Film industry. I want to live entirely self-sustained and comfortably enough so that I can see plays whenever I want and buy Taste The Difference instead of Sainsbury's Basics. I want to be proud of myself, and I know that this takes hard work and commitment. Being caught up in the grasp of procrastination does not make me ignorant or blind to cold facts like that. In fact in my experience, it makes me hyper-aware of what I'm doing/not doing, but clouds my vision of how to challenge this. When I'm having a particularly unproductive Saturday, and it gets to that all too familiar 3:45pm realisation, I get aggressively frustrated at myself, work myself up into an emotional mess, but then have no clue how to channel this drive in to anything other having a shower, or cooking some pasta, or watching a film. And this effectively is the nature of procrastination's vicious circle.

I'm aware that I've begun talking about procrastination like it's a condition a doctor can diagnose, but honestly, that's what it feels like. To say that I struggle to get work done would not come close to justifying the conflict that I too often find myself in. 

To end, I want to say, to myself mostly, that I'm sure at the heart of this issue is an argument about will-power and self-motivation. There is no easy way out of this state, there's no magic spell to chant, pill to swallow or small habit to alter. In order to be the grabbing-life-by-the-balls proactive go-getter I am so hungry to be,  then it is me and only me that can fundamentally make that happen.

Over and out.

The next step

[That post I was referring to the other day..? Well I've finished it (sort of)!]


Often referred to as "the next step", the reality behind this cliché phrase is anything but a step. In fact, it doesn't really qualify as a leap, or even a swim in my experience, but more like a long haul flight. To the South Pole. Or perhaps the North if you live in Brazil and are equally as out of your depth as I am, in England.

This over embellished metaphor is referring to the fore-dooming question that inevitably awaits us all at one moment or another; what are you going to do with your life? This abyss is sitting before me right now. It’s been here for a while, and it’s not really budging. When I look to how other people are dealing with said question, I notice that it’s become a social norm for the survivors of A Levels to go to university and perhaps get a degree. And that's what I'd like to do, I think. However, the query that's truly bothering me, and thus prompted the creation of this sorrowful first blog post is not whether to go to university, but rather, what course to take. Now bare with me here, because that may seem straight forward to many people and therefore I may sound like I am overreacting, (to be honest, I probably am, although hopefully not as much as you may immediately think), but I am one of those unfortunate souls who were not blessed with a sense of direction in life, making this a choice that demands inhumane hours of research, thought, more research and personal discovery.

To set the scene of my current crisis, in May this year I finished my AS courses in English Literature, History, Drama and Art and in June I began my A2 courses in all of the above except history.

Of my current subjects, Drama is my favourite and the one I think I will enjoy studying for another three years the most. This belief brings a multitude of feelings to surface. A good point being that I have finally narrowed down my interests to a particular field, making writing a personal statement indescribably easier. (I have had countless battles with myself over the past year and a half about whether I want to pursue art or drama, or both, or pick up something entirely new like psychology, sociology, or photography. There was also a drama-school phase, but I have decided once and for all to postpone this aspiration.) Negatively, drama is widely considered a non-academic vocational subject that offers limited employment opportunities, which as my dear grandmother (ily Granny) unceasingly reminds me, is the only reason for going to University.

So to relate this back to my sparkling metaphor (sarcasm), I have had to do a LOT of research to find drama courses right for me, and this has proved difficult because this means looking to 21 year old me, and I can’t see her yet. I’ve had to consider my interest in the theory of drama, my willingness to write essays, how much teaching I want to receive, what elements of drama I am most interested in, whether I want to risk conventional job opportunities for acting branches and so on. I’ve also found, as suggested previously, that the adults in my life have a LOT of opinions on this field of work. Watching people physically grimace in front of me when I boldly admit to being interested in drama is pretty disheartening. This has led to me habitually lying to the euphemistic questions asking what I'm planning on doing when I leave school. "I'm interested in journalism and teaching" has become my most common fob story to settle the nerves of these wise elders, because apparently these career branches don't require back-up plans. (Oh! the dreaded back-up plan.) Apparently these areas of work fit into the safe and stable category. I'm not convinced this has been proven true, but either way, it's better than that acting malarkey. And I know I am young and grossly inexperienced in the world and people are only looking out for me because they probably do know better. But I’m willing to embrace the challenges drama brings. If I end up living the life of the stereotypical waitress dreaming of being an actor, so be it, I’ll never regret spending three years studying my favourite subject. 


Upon contemplation, I realise that this issue has a lot to do with the hindrance of money. If every higher education institution didn’t charge such extortionate amounts of money for every element of the university experience, then I might I might be able to afford to get it wrong; I could afford to pick the wrong course and do another one after or instead. (Well this post has taken an unexpected turn haha woops didn’t mean to step into the political/economical zone, I’m waay out of my depth now, so let’s backtrack and jump into my comfort zone of melodrama)

When did I grow out of the age where wanting to be an actor was seen as merely ambitious, instead of risky and non-academic? I hate this self-re-evaluation that the world suddenly calls us to undergo, less than ten years after we were supported for announcing that when we grow up, we were going to be princesses, cowboys, and pop stars. I don't mean to dismiss all those who set their hearts on being vets, doctors, teachers and lawyers at aged 5 and have grown to see those dreams through, because that's awesome, but they don’t deserve any pity haha. I don't really know where I'm going with this anymore, (did I ever??) but I suppose my main point is that it's sad that at aged 16/17, I'm expected to know where I want my life to go, and whether this will be prosperous or not. I am not legally allowed to drive, vote, buy alcohol or cigarettes, but I'm filling out forms on the UCAS website and writing a personal statement determining the rest of my life? I know this has been happening for years and years, and I'm one of millions to go through this process, but I really don't like it.

I’ll write something more light-hearted soon, but this is important to me. Heck (who even says that haha) this subject is all I think about and act upon at the moment, so it’s good to express it like this.

Where I am

Oh.



This is a lot harder than I originally anticipated.

I began making this blog back in early June and finalised my current layout and formatting in early July, I think.

I then got straight on to writing a post.

I've been editing it ever since.



This post is sat in a word document, unfinished, and is becoming more and more irrelevant with every passing day. Each time I go to edit it in the hope of making it fit for the internet, I have to change a tense or update a piece of information mentioned, and it's really losing it's purpose. I'm wasting so much time on it, and I'm not sure what to do about this. I'm supposed to be writing Drama coursework, English essays, and filling up pages in my sketchbook, but no, I'm rewriting paragraph after paragraph of a private piece of futile literature.



I'm not even entirely sure why I'm publishing this - it's hardly any better than said post. I suppose the idea of documenting my early struggles is quite appealing in the hope that one day this might actually work. But until then, I can only hope that I have a burst of inspiration soon.



The only way is up, haha :)