Laziness Drives All Progress, or Does It?
Sometimes I have a feeling that I can do more than I actually do. But when I try to do more, I have to face Her Majesty Laziness. Well, everyone knows what I am talking about. I define laziness as the situation when you know what to do and how to do something, but … you do not want to do this. Certainly, everyone has own idea about laziness. Moreover, everyone has own type and symptoms of it. Some of those are typical and some are quite individual.
• Lack of willpower is one of the most frequent syndromes that cause laziness. Sometimes, even when everything is well planned and considered, your laziness can take over you and keep you from coming to the point for days, or maybe for months and years. In such case, it is very important to take action and at least begin doing what you planned to do: it can make you get focused on your task.
• Lack of motivation is another type of laziness. Sometimes a person is not sure, why he or she has to do something, or he/she expects someone else to do this job. It is possible to fight with this type of laziness by increasing motivation. Think about the reward you will receive for this task and consider all the pros and cons. Also, remember that if your task is not properly elaborated and considered, only motivation will not be enough for completing this task successfully.
• For many people, laziness is an important part of their lifestyle. Let’s see how everything comes about: a guy receives a task and starts thinking over the ways to complete it in a rational way. It takes some time and efforts, so people around him start thinking that he is lazy because he is not doing anything else but thinking. Finally, under this influence the guy also starts thinking that he is lazy, so he tries to do everything possible to change himself. Usually, it goes from bad to worse. However, in the end of the ends, when the deadline arrived, our guy manages to complete the task successfully and on time.
• Sometimes our laziness is a drive to avoid responsibility. The roots of this problem go back to our childhood, when our parents used to protect us from the necessity to accept full responsibility or take the consequences for our deeds. This is one of the most dangerous types of laziness, which, however, can be cured.
• Unless I be mistaken, it was Sigmund Freud who argued that laziness takes source from the drive of all human beings to seek pleasure. When we do something, we take pleasure from what we are doing. When we are lazing, we also take pleasure from not doing anything.
• Some lucky people have so called “intuitive laziness”. They know very well what they need to do, but they feel lazy to do that. Later on it turns out that it was actually not necessary to do that. This type of laziness can save your time and efforts from doing useless things, but in many situations it is quite deceptive.
• There is one type of laziness that has no negative nature. For many people laziness works as a defense mechanism for overwork. What I am talking about is: some people work so much and simply get tired of working hard all the time. They slow down and immediately start thinking that they are lazy, start blaming themselves for that and go into depression. But all they actually needed was a rest.
• Many lazy people used to justify their laziness by saying “Laziness Drives All Progress”. Just give it a thought: is it our usual bottomless laziness, or our desire to do something faster and without spending much of efforts? Only such “creative laziness” can drive all progress. What progress can you achieve by lying on the sofa doing nothing?