Mapping my Procrastination with Systems Thinking
Posted on November 14, 2021“Phone – check; mask – check; metro card – check; power bank – check” these are a few quick reminders I give to myself before pulling close the door every morning. Despite knowing that I won’t be able to make it in time for the class, I cautiously spend half a minute to not leave any of my essentials behind before departing. Having lost the personal set of keys, I feel this in-my-mind checklist to be the final resort for not having to do without the important stuff. Well, I can always ring a couple of bells and wake my flatmate up but not only will that make me a victim of her agitated why-did-you-wake-me-up face but also lead to a further delay.
The intent of sharing my daily morning episode is not to denounce myself by elucidating my behaviour of always running late or being forgetful but to make some observations about my behaviour evident. Until I am getting ready, there is a sense of hope and optimism for starting the day on a positive note and making it in time but as soon as I reach the door, there is a sudden fear and feeling of helplessness for not being able to step back inside my house without keys. It feels analogous to being imposed by the touch-move rule of Chess. I do not want to get rid of the undesirable feelings of fear and helplessness rather work upon my estimation of time to prevent the perpetual delays. Hence, in the following blogpost I plan to analyse my behaviour as a systems problem with the help of a stock-and-flow diagram from the book Thinking in Systems by Donella Meadows (Meadows, 2009).
“You’ll be thinking not in terms of a static world, but a dynamic one. You’ll stop looking for who’s to blame; instead you’ll start asking, “What’s the system?” The concept of feedback opens up the idea that a system can cause its own behavior.” (Meadows, 2009). It was a no brainer to invariably account and blame procrastination as factor for my delays and not making it in time. I did that too until examining the problem with respect to resulting feedback loops in a system.
Figure 1. Stock-and-flow diagram depicting the delays as stock governed by reinforcing loop (R) of Pseudo Optimism and balancing loop (B) of Task Completion
The Figure 1 represents stock-and-flow diagram with the stock as the delays while performing the tasks. The delays are regulated by a reinforcing loop and a balancing loop respectively. The reinforcing loop surfaces due to a discrepancy in the estimation of time required to complete a task. The inaccurate estimation of time is a resultant of unanticipated difficulty while performing the tasks. On further contemplation, I figured out that I often tend to schedule or perform my tasks in an incorrect fashion. I tend to complete less challenging, smaller and unimportant tasks in the beginning and keep the more cumbersome tasks for the end. The fact that I prioritise to load the water filter despite it being nearly full (my OCD and satisfaction of seeing the water drip down filling the filter urges me to prioritise this task) before choosing to start cooking or unloading the dishwasher elucidates haphazard task selection. With the passage of time, the difficulty of task increases but the amount of time at my disposal to complete the tasks decreases. This discrepancy gives rise to Pseudo Optimism. I coined this term to describe the feeling of hopefulness of completing subsequent tasks in lesser time by being more efficient. I believe, this hope is a treacherous and risky feeling. This hope constantly murmurs, “You got this. Don’t give up or abandon the tasks. Just speed up a bit to accommodate the quality and quantity of the tasks as planned”. Finally, this leads me to schedule my work until the last minute making up the entire reinforcing loop. Contrastingly, the balancing loop comprised by the completed tasks tends to lessen the delays but reinforcing loop is much more overbearing and dominating compared to balancing loop resulting into more delays. One of the other attributes adding onto the delays is the disinclination towards compromising the quality of the work.
I have often perceived myself as a blatant procrastinator. Procrastination can be regarded as an act of delaying or postponing something. (Oxford Languages , n.d.). I had attached the connotations of being a sluggish and dilatory person with my behaviour. I often used to wonder and trace back my trajectory to discover the defaults leading to delays. Often there was no lethargy or delay in the beginning; however, I was markedly running late by the end. It is with the systems mapping, I could relieve myself of being termed as a “procrastinator” and self-introspect to prioritise my tasks to avoid delays.
-HS
References
Meadows, D. H. (2009). Thinking in Systems. London: Earthscan.
Oxford Languages . (n.d.). Retrieved from https://languages.oup.com/google-dictionary-en/