First, I have not finished my research paper. It’s been so long since I’ve written a substantial research paper of any kind that my “procrastination impulse” is soaring through the roof. I’ve tried several strategies to fight the desire to get out of my desk chair.

The first strategy was chewing gum. I try to only buy Trident because it’s good for your teeth. I’m one of those orally fixated people who can reduce the amount they fidget if their mouth is occupied (get your mind out of the gutters) generally with food or gum. Since this desire for “flight” is so strong, I chew almost manically. Result: gum loses flavor and pliability in record time. End product: I am out of gum.

Second strategy, keep typing even without editing until you just have no words left in you. This produced several paragraphs of nonsense. After I was done, it was hard work trimming back and finding the nuggets of research and my comprehension of them.

My last and current strategy has yielded much better results. For a reason I will probably never research, I can talk about my research topic at length. I can explain it to someone competently. My mind does what it has to in order to make sense to the person I am talking to. However, if I try to type this out onto screen, my mind becomes preoccupied and distracted by the words I see on the screen, everything I just typed. So, I put on my headphones with the microphone. I opened Audacity. I started to talk.

I imagined there was someone in the room with me. Better yet, I imagined I was actually chatting with my boyfriend online like I occasionally do. I recorded what I said. Then I readied my hands on the keyboard with my word processor before me as I played back my recording. Voila! I had fairly understandable sentences. These aren’t sophisticated by any means, but they’re better than what I had before.

I would give you a sampling of my ramblings so far, but I would first have to make a Space Upgrade that would cost me money. I could make a lame video on YouTube with a static image and my voice in the background, but that’s too much effort. I still have a research paper to finish.

At some point today, I am going to treat myself to some dessert. I DESERVE IT.

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