This is not how I want to face every day.
I know some people who don’t get started on a task or deal with a problem until it becomes a crisis. They wait and procrastinate and put off until further inaction will result in disaster. Then, most of the time, they scramble everything together and get done what needs doing.
They say, “I thrive under pressure.”
Maybe this is true for them. For me, the pressure, the anxiety and the fear, can become overwhelming. I get paralyzed. I drop the ball.
That doesn’t stop me from procrastinating. It just means my threshold for crisis is much lower. A deadline a week or a month away produces as much urgency in me as a tomorrow morning deadline provides for them. I know (from sad experience) that if I put it off any longer, I’ll freeze up and utterly fail.
This gives me the reputation as someone who is responsible, who plans ahead, who is organized. If only.
I’m just as crisis-driven as anybody else. The only difference is my tolerance for anxiety. I hate the stuff. And it’s taken a while for me to learn how to get moving before the pressure crushes me.
Currently, my goal is to head off anxiety at the pass. (more…)
