Procrastination is the defining style of my writing, a last-minute culmination of what I have sent too long thinking about. That it does not read this way is more a testament to the craft of writing, the “10% inspiration, 90% perspiration” of committing yourself to completing a cogent work hundreds of times.
Despite this, I would rather my writing not become a race. For example, I was recently asked to write a witness statement for someone completing an apprenticeship course. Once I knew the date for when it was needed, that immediately allowed myself into thinking I need not write anything at all until nearer the time, but I had the time to think of what I needed to include. Meanwhile, I started to worry too much about the small things: how precise in detail did I need to be, and how long did the statement need to be – things that were not specified, but might make a difference to who needed the finished piece.
In the end, the completed statement, delivered on the day before it was needed, was exactly what that person required, and I need not have worried, despite having manoeuvred myself into a position where I did. What was worse, it took only minutes to write, but I gave myself a week of thinking time.
Therefore, I have sought to address this problem, making my writing process more productive. Ironically, I had wanted to conduct this earlier, but the copy I ordered of Robert Boice’s book “Professors as Writers: A Self-Help Guide to Productive Writing” was lost in the post, requiring me to order it again. While geared towards academic writing, the book’s direct approach was recommended to me as an aid to self-discipline – it is not just a matter of turning up earlier, it was what happens once there.
The major draw for me was a “Blocking Questionnaire” devised and standardised by Boice in tests on hundreds of people, its categories used across the book to help you locate the advice you then need. Broken into three sections, you are asked to assess a series of reactions to facing a tough writing assignment, the emotions that creates in yourself, and how you would approach completing it. With procrastination only one possible bock, I was interested if it was my only block, or a symptom of something larger.
Sixty-nine considerations later, the most memorable being “I’ll feel like writing if I do something else first”, and “If I were working efficiently, writing would come more easily, in more finished form”, my “Overall Blocking Mean Score” came to 5.13, just tipping from an indicator of inefficient writing into there being more serious problems, with recurring disruptive blocks. However, the maximum possible score was 10, so I was assured that any identifiable problems would be easier to address.
Categorising my scores revealed a more interesting issue: with little between them, procrastination was ranked joint third with apprehension about the work at hand, with “perfectionism” being a larger factor, and “rules” being largest of all.
What should I take from these results, apart from reading the rest of “Professors as Writers” to address them? I have more insight into what is either causing procrastination, or what it is covering. Based on the answers I gave, the blocks appear to be more emotionally and socially led. I have no problem with writing itself, but how writing makes me feel, and thoughts of how others will react, matter more – then again, they always do.
“Rules” was not an answer I expected, but the rules I put around completing the witness statement shows they do have an effect. I have been setting myself the target of completing a weekly article on various subjects, at five hundred-plus words in length, but that is more a deadline, or obligation, set outside of the act of actually completing it – at least, that is how I think of it, but is the act of setting myself a task triggering the construction of barriers, when all I have to answer to is myself? Time to read the rest of the book...
