from paulgraham

[anhinga_anhinga]

"[Not procrastinating] is, strictly speaking, impossible. There are an infinite number of things you could be doing. No matter what you work on, you're not working on everything else. So the question is not how to avoid procrastination, but how to procrastinate well."

Comments

[cema.livejournal.com]

"Good procrastination is avoiding errands in order to do real work", he says.

Errands are often a big part of our work, and avoiding that may have unpleasant consequences. Like wasting time on arguing with coworkes and bosses why you do it this way and not that way or why you are not doing it at all.

"[R]eal work needs two things errands don't: big chunks of time, and the right mood". True for any kind of creative work. In particular, for many kinds of programmer's work. Definitely for science. Obviously for arts. "There may be types of work that can only be done in long, uninterrupted stretches, when inspiration hits, rather than dutifully in scheduled little slices." I think we all have observed that.

"Conversely, forcing someone to perform errands synchronously is bound to limit their productivity." This is why my work day starts and ends a few hours after everyone else's. But this is not sufficient for me; I often come to work on Saturdays or Sundays, or work at home (after regular hours). On the other hand, when I am at work with other people around, I tend to look around seeing whom I could help rather than concentrate on my own work.

However, the company I am working in is not doing anything I would be very interested in or particularly proud of or anything that would have made me want to work besides the check. I am not working on "big things" he mentions; and do not expect to, in the foreseeable future.

[http://users.livejournal.com/_rowan_tree_/]

"There may be types of work that can only be done in long, uninterrupted stretches, when inspiration hits, rather than dutifully in scheduled little slices." - working in long, uninterrupted stretches has nothing to do with real procrastination. The whole article is proving how good is good.
As for the errands and small stuff, they have to be done at some point, and postponing them can cause substantial problems. As an example, postponing bying tickets to a conference causes inconvenient flights, extra money/stress spent on dealing with it, etc. This article is clearly written by someone who has a wife or other "significant other" who has no idea what life consists of.
It also implies that there is an objective and static ordering of importance of things that need to be done.
I should write an article on this subject - i have much more interesting things to say. Will go grade homeworks now, though. Speaking of priorities and procrastination.

Correction :-)

[http://users.livejournal.com/_rowan_tree_/]

who has a wife or other "significant other" who has no idea what life consists of -> who has a wife or other "significant other" and therefore has no idea what life consists of.