this post was submitted on 26 Jul 2024
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[–] [email protected] 98 points 4 months ago (1 children)

Standard operating procedure for high school

[–] [email protected] 57 points 4 months ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 57 points 4 months ago (1 children)

And experienced professional 😐

[–] sugar_in_your_tea 4 points 4 months ago (1 children)

Can confirm, am professional and am procrastinating. I know I can bang my work out in like 2-4 hours, so why should I spend all week doing it?

[–] [email protected] 5 points 4 months ago

The trick is to spend the other hours of the workweek looking busy like the task is taking the full amount of time.

[–] [email protected] 75 points 4 months ago (1 children)

I once read someone make a point (more eloquently than me) that procrastination is your brain's internal bullshit detector. For example, if a lion were to break into your room right now, you would get the fuck up and flee no matter how lazy/neet you may be. Therefore the matters you procrastinate on are a big old bag of hooey (according to your mind).

[–] [email protected] 75 points 4 months ago (2 children)

I procrastinate on cooking and then complain that I'm hungry and there's no time to make food. I think my brain is broken.

[–] [email protected] 52 points 4 months ago (3 children)

your brain is fully aware that you can just have two handful of nuts and be good for a couple of hours. Just because your brain also believes that you gotta have a proper meal doesn't matter

[–] [email protected] 10 points 4 months ago (1 children)

I'll see your handfuls of nuts, and raise you a couple spoonfuls of peanut butter.

It's a) relatively cheap b) delicious c) easily edible on the fly with a spoon, time constraints be damned. It serves the purpose quite well, and even throws a bit of sugar in there too.

Not exactly a balanced diet, but it does accomplish the goal reasonably effectively and frequently is already in the house.

Also good when not medically quite at 100% - when not at my best, I do everything I can to follow dr. orders, ofc, but sometimes it's more efficient to throw a tiny bit of sugar at one's brain in a (relatively) healthier way, than to keep fighting it during recovery.

[–] sugar_in_your_tea 9 points 4 months ago

I try to alternate:

  • peanut butter
  • banana
  • nuts
  • cheese

I'm basically a gatherer.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 4 months ago (2 children)

I don't have any nuts in the pantry because I don't like them. My brain knows this.

[–] [email protected] 11 points 4 months ago (2 children)

A can of Pringles, whatever

[–] [email protected] 7 points 4 months ago

Well thanks to my unhelpful brain I'm losing weight from not eating enough

[–] Corkyskog 4 points 4 months ago (3 children)

I saw someone make "mashed potatoes" out of Pringles... seriously wondered why. But they did.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 4 months ago

I guess one could but... that just sounds expensive and weird-tasting to me.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 4 months ago (1 children)
[–] Corkyskog 2 points 4 months ago

Yeah it actually did, looked slightly less disgusting than I would have expected it to.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 4 months ago

I love that! Thanks for sharing, that's an idea that has never crossed my mind

[–] [email protected] 4 points 4 months ago

Procrastinate long enough and you'll still be eating them though. Why? Because you haven't been shopping and it's wayyy easier than cooking -my brain

[–] [email protected] 3 points 4 months ago

This is true and also works the other way around. There is no food but i'm too lazy to go on a grocery run. Suddenly more food spawns in my house for 3 more days.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago) (1 children)

Not missing a meal (or a few even) won't kill you, try getting to a starving state and then see if your brain lets you park your ass on the couch.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 4 months ago

The executive functions are a tiebreak system, in many ways. It balances the various possible options, both benefits and costs, short term and long.

Procrastination is when this system can't overcome various situational inertias. I tend to think of it akin to a teacher in a classroom. The kids are perfectly capable of raiding a kitchen, when sufficiently hungry. It's also impossible to keep them focused on maths, when a dozen labrador puppies are released into the classroom. Within its limits however, it's supposed to turn disparate drives into coherent action.

I have adhd. The teacher is exhausted from a 3 day bender, and someone swiched their coffee to decaf. Avoiding situations that cause a procrastination lockup are a fact of life.

[–] [email protected] 59 points 4 months ago (1 children)

I definitely have never done this before, no sir, not even once

[–] [email protected] 42 points 4 months ago (2 children)

There's a Ted talk on this called panic monkey.

[–] [email protected] 35 points 4 months ago

I watched it instead of doing an assignment in high school. Made a lot of sense and little difference.

[–] [email protected] 18 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago) (1 children)

Just looked it up. It's a talk based on the Wait But Why? blog: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=arj7oStGLkU

FYI, the name for the thing he's describing is ADHD. The "rational decision maker" is called executive function.

Edit: here is the blog post the talk is based on

[–] [email protected] 4 points 4 months ago

Glorious, never knew about the post. Thanks

[–] [email protected] 38 points 4 months ago

adrenaline is nature's Adderall.

[–] [email protected] 31 points 4 months ago (1 children)

If you leave it till the last minute, it only takes a minute!

[–] [email protected] 28 points 4 months ago (1 children)

executives call a variation this “optimization”. oh it took you four weeks instead of five? do it in four next time. give me a 300,000 dollar bonus please

[–] sugar_in_your_tea 10 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago)

As a software engineer, the trick is to never tell them it takes four weeks, you promise 5 weeks, procrastinate for 4, and do it in 2, blaming the extra on software being hard. Most execs understand that, and only being a week late is pretty good (my boss adds 2 weeks to all my estimates for his own reporting).

It's a subtle art that most contractors have perfected. Some even deliver on-time, but that's dangerous because the exec might catch on (software is never on-time).

[–] [email protected] 20 points 4 months ago (2 children)
[–] [email protected] 11 points 4 months ago (1 children)

True. I have a tendency to behave like this when it comes to work like this, and whenever I do it almost always leads to a bunch of unnecessary stress. It has genuinely made me better at solving problems on the fly, but I don't need that skill as much when I just plan a little better and actually stick to it.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 4 months ago

Yes, It's horrible, and can lead to minimizing any responsibilities you have. Even if you consciously want to accept a new responsibility/task, and have pre-planned how to do it well; Yet, you'll struggle to keep the promise to yourself. Self-blame will only make it worse.

Near the deadline the brain has (at best) already done all the work subconsciously, and you only to manifest the thing into reality. Don't doubt this, trashing the subconscious work is the worst thing you can do to yourself in a such situation.

(I'm not 100% sure I'm talking about the same subject, but anyway.)

[–] [email protected] 6 points 4 months ago

Welcome to ADHD lol

[–] [email protected] 9 points 4 months ago

This is me but i only manage 50% and fail

[–] [email protected] 7 points 4 months ago (1 children)

Anon used ChatGPT to do the assignment, didn't they

[–] [email protected] 5 points 4 months ago

no they just have ADHD