DC — S1E4 — Professional Procrastination
Season 1 · Episode 4
Good morning, Capital Scholars friends and family!
This week we are on Chapter 3 of 7 in our book, How to Change. Today's topic is procrastination.
I have suffered through procrastination in various ways throughout my life. I think my methods of counter-acting procrastination center around planning tools. Schedules and task lists work well to combat my procrastination by assigning personal deadlines for things that otherwise have none or breaking up large tasks into many smaller tasks with their very own deadlines. This is almost as motivating as ordinary assigned deadlines, although the stakes have never been as high as Milkman describes in the book. I have yet to use “hard” commitment devices in my personal life, but my family and friends often use “soft” commitment to help each other accomplish our goals. Simply sharing your goals with others is often enough to motivate you. Even if they don't need to hold you accountable, simply knowing that they would—should you drift—is enough.
Milkman describes two types of people who do or do not use commitment. The naïfs are those who do not use them, and instead believe they can avoid temptation with willpower alone. The sophisticates are those who embrace and harness the power of commitment to achieve their goals. I am quite afraid that I am counted among the naïfs at present. I think I can see that changing as I begin to take on greater and greater projects of self-improvement. At least for this summer, however, I have so many concrete deadlines and responsibilities that adding on more through hard commitments would be unreasonable.
The two goals I’ve set for the second half of the internship are closely related. I’ll be in DC for the next two years at the very least, so my first goal is to explore the city more; specifically, to find an apartment. I look forward to getting to know the neighborhoods over the next four weeks, as well as touring places. If anyone knows of an apartment or someone with one, please let me know! My second goal is to keep networking and gaining confidence in socializing in this strange new way. To that end, I’ll continue going to events and networking opportunities, and connecting with the many people in DC who have fascinating lives and careers.
To the second part of the prompt, I have gotten to go to many events and sites outside of work; tonight especially was exciting; I reconnected with an old friend who was in town for a day. We visited the Great American State Fair happening in DC this week.