It usually starts on Wednesday. The feeling that the weekend is only a few days away and then I’ll be able to do anything and everything I’ve been planning. I’ll finish the project I’ve been putting off for months, I’ll start the one that I’ve already bought supplies for, or dabble in a new technique that I’ve seen. This doesn’t only apply to my artwork, it can be the slipcover on the flowery living room couch, bread baking, or planting a vegetable garden. By midweek, I’m already starting to daydream about all the free time I’ll have over the weekend to start and complete everything on my want-to-do list. By mid-morning Friday, I’m watching the clock tick ever closer to “Me Time.”
Then it’s Friday afternoon, and I’m tired from work. I’ll just take a quick nap, or get some coffee for a little bit. And now it’s nighttime, and I have plans, or I don’t feel like starting a new project right now since I have all weekend. I may sleep in Saturday, and have to do some housework, or keep a promise to be somewhere on time. Maybe Saturday afternoon, I finally get around to picking up a project, but then I get frustrated with a problem and I walk away, but I swear, I’ll start early Sunday morning.
Sundays are generally good work days for me, but I spend a lot of time annoyed with myself for not getting started earlier. By Sunday night, I’m vowing that I’ll be better next weekend and I won’t let this happen again. Monday and Tuesday are spent regretting time lost while working my day job. But by Wednesday…..
I have a new plan to break this cycle. It’s a two part plan. Part one is to stop thinking of the weekends as the only free time I have. I have at least five unscheduled hours a night, five days a week. That’s 25 hours, every single week, to spend as I please. That’s practically a free day that I can fill however I choose. I’m starting this week with writing a long post, instead of feeling like it’s a “weekend activity.”
Part two involves letting go of the time that I should be doing something else. Yes, I could be doing activities that will produce a tangible end product (like knitting, cooking, or creating business cards), but I don’t need to be working towards a goal all the time. I know that I won’t be productive all the time and that’s okay. If I’m reading blogs, listening to a podcast or sitting around at a coffee shop with friends, I’d rather enjoy those moments, than feel guilty for not feeling productive. This is something I still need to work on.
I was going to end this with a comment about using a post about procrastination to procrastinate from my work. Aside from being lame, it would be wrong. I can say with some certainty that my time would be better spent finishing the work for the YoHo Show that I install in two days, but I don’t regret the time it took to put these thoughts down. I may have made the wrong decision about how to spend my time tonight, but that doesn’t mean it was a bad decision.
Sarah Divi 