Flaws: Procrastination

   It's always good to be honest, especially with yourself. It's quite easy to lie to yourself, and even easier to start believing it. Sometimes they're little lies like you don't consider yourself to be able to do something - maybe speak in a certain accent - and then you believe it. Other times they're much bigger and much more damaging, like if you consider yourself to be unattractive or fat, or even stupid. These can honestly damage your outlook on not just yourself but everything you do. I've decided, in this case, that I'm going to be more honest with myself, and really look level-headedly at my faults. And unlucky you, I'm doing it right here.

   For this post, I've decided to focus on procrastination as my first flaw - though not necessarily my worst one. I've chosen this first because I've been falling victim to it a lot lately, and it occurred to me - both to write this post and that I've been falling victim - because I decided to just get on with something I'd been putting off only an hour and a half ago.

   I've noticed that I procrastinate a lot. And the more important something is, the more I'm likely to procrastinate. I think it's the same for a lot of people, but I'm not other people, I'm me. Therefore, only I know how often I procrastinate and if, in my opinion, it's a lot or not. And in my opinion, it is. I procrastinated with taking Sugar to the vet to get looked at when I first noticed her mammory tumor. I them procrastinated to take her to the vet to be put down. I did both of those with Lucky, too, the only difference was, I never took Lucky to the vet in the end. I should have, and I do regret it.

   I've also procrastinated, and still am, with getting Seeg's residency sorted out. He can legally work and live here without being a UK citizen, since the Netherlands is part of the EEU, or EEA or something...I think I'm getting it mixed up with a games publishing company...but either way, I know that he'll struggle to get a job without his citizenship, and I have no idea at all what happens with medical care. He has insurance but we don't know if that covers anything here - or rather, I don't know, and whenever he answers me he never sounds certain. But if the worst happens then we might have a problem. And you never know when an accident might happen. Be it me embedding the xbox controller in his head when he keeps making his character hit mine on Rayman, or be it him falling down the stairs (that sounds sinister; I can honestly say I have no intention or desire to push him down the stairs).

   And I've been procrastinating with working on my synopsis and cover letter for this first book.

   It seems that the more important something is, the more likely I am to put it off, but what's worse is that if it's something important to me, I'm even more likely.

   Like I said, I started thinking about this an hour and a half ago, when I finally picked up some paper and a pen and just started work on the synopsis. I'd tried it before, and managed about a page, and it wasn't very good. I don't know what happened today, whether my head was working overtime today, or if it wasn't working at all when I gave it my first and only attempt a few weeks ago, but I managed three, maybe four pages once it's typed up, and I think I've given all the necessary information an agent would expect from a synopsis. Though that's not to say it's perfect.

   But I finally did it. I've realised something that I have unfortunately "realised" several times this year already, and have also preached about a few times too. And it's simply not to put things off. Every time you say "I'll do it Monday", the pedestal gets higher. I've even made it into a typography image that I intend to make prints of to sell, but it looks like I'll have to get it tattooed onto my forehead (y'know, once I get the archaeopteryx on the back of my elbow and a dragon egg on my shoulder) so I don't forget it again.

   It also doesn't help that I've read from several sources that writing a synopsis is hard - possibly the hardest part of writing a book - and that I also know that getting Seeg's UK citizenship is probably going to either be expensive or take time and have a lot of restrictions on it. We intended to get it moving last January and it never happened. I then told myself this January (you see how fast that pedestal grew?) and now it's March and nothing's happened. It also doesn't help that I have little idea on where to start with it.

   And as for the r--Sugar and Lucky, it was a matter of worry that they may not pull through the operations (I already knew about mammory tumors months before either of them had developed them, and the subsequent consequences of both acting on it, and leaving it), and also a matter of money. Vet bills aren't cheap, but fortunately my dad payed for all of them except Lucky's initial trip to the vet. As for taking them both to be put down, I don't like waiting around, wondering if it's happened yet, and I especially don't like knowing that it will happen on a certain day. I wanted them both to pass away here, but it's a selfish thing to want, to prolong their suffering like that.

   Like I said, the more you think about doing things but keep putting it off, the harder it's going to be to do. It took a lot for me to be able to pick that pen and paper up today, but I managed a pretty good stand on my synopsis (still needs to be redrafted to a presentable state), and I even wrote my cover letter! The cover letter itself can be printed out and posted tomorrow! Though...I'm sure I'll find an excuse not to do it. Some sort of "I need to make sure it's perfect" eventhough I won't do any more work on the letter between now and printing it. I'll tell you all now, and myself, though I'm sure I won't listen, tomorrow is never too soon to get your dreams going. In fact, neither is today, but the reason I'm saying "tomorrow" is because it's 21:46 right now and the post office is shut...actually, you know what? Spur of the moment decision, I'm going to grab the addresses and the names of the people from my yearbook who haven't specified their genres and have also not left a webpage, and I'm going to post them out tomorrow. I made a sale so I can get some stamps when I go up to post the package tomorrow.

   Honestly, I know I go around giving advice to people but I rarely take it myself.

   I'm not great at rounding off posts (as you may well have noticed) but I'll end it with the point I've mentioned a few times: if there is something important that you need to do, don't keep putting it off. It's important, either to your, or to someone else. The sooner you get to it, the sooner it'll be done and you won't need to worry anymore, and the sooner you can turn your attention to something else and maybe sleep a little easier.

   And if you don't know where to start, find out. Open google and do a search. Honestly, it won't be that hard. The more you think on things, the bigger they get, the more horns they grow, until they're flying around and spewing fire and you don't have a chance in hell of tackling it and getting the upper hand.

   I can't help thinking I should write myself a letter...there's an idea! Anyway, peace out peeps. That concludes the first of my posts of flaws. More are sure to follow.