Fixintas

There is a disease that afflicts millions of men and woman each year. It is, in the long run, far worse than the swine flu; worse than cancer; worse than AIDS. The Fixintas is an procrastination-affliction that begins with the Put-it-off-till-tomorrow’s, progresses to a sour, helplessness existence called the Doldrums, and, if left untreated for the youthful part of one’s life, can lead to a dreadful result of the Shoulda-Woulda-Coulda’s.

It starts, in most instances, by a casual 4:30-laziness. An attitude that wafts the wants of ‘today’ toward tomorrow. Often, the above-mentioned wants are the seemingly trivial, day-to-day events such as a call-back to an old friend. At work, I commonly put off the need-to-be-approved-invoices and the need-to-be-called potential clients. Instead, I cruise Facebook till the end of the day. Annually, it is just as easy to put off a Canada canoe trip till next year. After all, it’s Canada and it's not going anywhere any time soon. Moreover, I am so BUSY. I am way, way too busy this year. “Maybe next year, if I can find the time.”

The problem is that these seemingly insignificant tasks that we “put off until tomorrow” stack up on each tomorrow until they are lost in a waste basket of last month’s lists. Some, and oftentimes many, of these to-do’s are foregone the second they are put off.

Deep down, whether or not we admit it at the moment, they are missed and it is the missing that leads to the second phase of the Fixintas: the Doldrums. In my mind, this is a green, slimy place. In my mind, it is the place from the kid’s movie – The Phantom Tollbooth.

In the movie, the main character, Milo, navigates his red convertible through a dark, slimy cave where he meets the Lethargians. As they pull him in to the slime-covered slow-paced existence in which they live, they tell him that "Why, you can do anything (in the doldrums), as long as it's nothing. Everything, as long as it isn't anything; so don't say there's nothin' to do in the doldrums. We dawdle a bit and then we loiter a while, and dawdle again. We gather our strength to start anew on all of the loafing and lounging we still have left to do. So don't say there's nothing to do in the doldrums, it's just not true."

Though the excerpt-poem per the Lethargian in the movie is well put, in a figurative and holistic sense, don’t take it too literally. The Doldrums can exist within a weed-ridden couch or inside the unchallenging white walls of a square office. The Doldrums are at the table at an early-to-late-morning-gas-station-coffee-stop; they exist on the other side of a Soap Opera with-in the restless suburban housewife; and they hang out on ghetto street corners. I can think of two people close to me who I believe presently exist in the that drull, circular place.

One works in the office next to me, the other, is one of my best friends. Each man has a job, goes, does his duty, and returns home. One, I believe, sulks all day and night every day and night in his misery. The other escapes by chemical means. The whole world is against each of them. Nothing, it seems is thier fault and I can relate to each of them, because I have been there.

It is kind-of like the central theme from another great movie –Groundhog Day, with Bill Murray. In case you live in a cave and you haven’t seen it, the gist of the movie is this: Bill Murray’s character, Phil Conner, continues to wake up on the same day, Groundhog Day, in the same small town of Punxsetawney, Pennsilvania. He begins, sour with life and the monotony of having to come to this same small town each year just to report on the ability of one little “vermot's” ability to see his shadow. One scene in the movie and the quote therein stands out in my mind. Phil, discouraged that he will ever get out of this dreadful day in this dreadfully boring town, is drinking heavily at a Bar that is in the town’s bowling alley. Sorry-for-himself, Phil says to the two towney-drunks that sit next to him – ‘do you ever feel like every single day is exactly the same as the previous and nothing you do or could ever do REALLY matters.’ One of the drunks responds; “That pretty much sums it up for me.”

Phil proceeds to give up on any hope for a future ‘meaningful’ life as he goes on a hilariously suicidal, armored-truck-robbing, town-hottie-seducing rampage. In the end, however….well, let’s get back to the point.

The third and final phase of the Fixintas is the Shoulda-Woulda-Coulda’s. My father and his brother (my uncle), reportedly used to call my Grandmother Shoulda-woulda-coulda. While they called her this in jest, I’m treating the term as the advanced and irreversible stages of a tragic ailment - the Fixintas. Once a person has contented through his healthy years, unproductive and easy-going amidst the Doldrums, he gets to a point of ‘awakened regret.’ The Shoulda-Woulda-Coulda-infected man looks back on his life as if he were J. Alfred Proofrock– the old, perpetually-indecisive man of the similarly named T.S. Elliot poem – as he wonders what life would-of been like if only could-of dared to try. Notice the many-a-old-men who are languidly crippled in there scowling, jealous-of-youth yearning for a relief-ful death from their constant, what-if-headache that continues to drain their capacity for any appreciation of the otherwise inherent beauty of day-to-day-life. As they usually wish their fate on all men, these grumpy old men are the Letharigians that coax and grumble new potential subjects into the Doldrums.

So, how can we avoid this seemingly inevitable, potentially horrible existence.

First, I look to the opposite of the above – kids. Why are they seemingly Fixinta-immune? Are they issued a behind-the-back vaccine just after birth. Notice that you never hear a kid say, “Let’s play ‘King of the Hill’ on Thursday.” No; they see, they want, they do. Children don’t plan; they never put off; they don’t have it in them to develop a case of the Fixintas. They are immune because they are daring. They are daring because they are unscathed. They are scathed because they are irresponsible.

That’s the answer, then. The anecdote is to forgo planning, right? Wrong. The answer is to forgo responsibility, right? Wrong. We, as adults, must be responsible. Responsability is, to me the precursor nesessary in order to define one as Adult. But adulthood is no excuse for the Fixintas.

Next, I'll borrow a soundbite from the number one golfer in the world. While he did end up choking yesterday at the TPC, Tiger Woods recently let loose a quote from an interview with Scott Van Pelt. It is possibly the most empowering statement from a man who otherwise should be perfectly content. You can find a more complete summary of the interview here, but the quote, in raw form, follows:

SVP: So there’s no point when you can sort of put the feet up on a Tuesday afternoon and say ‘Today I’m not going to the gym’.?

Tiger: “No. Because the next…that’s…I look at life as: the greatest thing about tomorrow is that I will be better than I am today. And that’s the way I’ve always lived my life. So I have no understanding why people do hit the snooze button because you have a chance to become a better person, become - for me - a better athlete…all the different things you can do to become better for tomorrow. Why wouldn’t you take advantage of that?”

With that attitude, it isn’t hard to see why the man is a living legend in his respective sport. But, let’s be real; it would be a whole lot easier to get up early every day to train to play golf. To train to do what it is that we REALLY want to do. Is that the answer? - Probably. Do I know all the answers? - Probably not. Am I presently (as I type) trying to figure out MY Fixinta-Remedy? – Yes.

To summarize, here is my current, always-evolving, step-by-step solution to Paralysis-due-to-Procrastination:

1. Determine what it is you want to do. What are you passionate about? Don’t look too hard. You know. Deep down, you know. Just acknowledge what you like, follow that curiosity, and accept that this is your passion.

2. Make lists. Daily; monthly; and yearly.

3. Borrowing a term from Stephen Covey, “Choose big rocks” to put on your lists i.e. Limit your commitments to those things that you can readily handle. Plan to achieve those commitments. Do.

4. Regulate on your waste-time. Don’t eliminate it, but regulate it. We all need our Beer-Couch-FamilyGuy-time, but be mindful not to melt into the lazy-boy. Relax for a while after work, then get up and get going.

5. Make a side list of things that you want to one-day do but don’t have the time to get to right now. I’ve named mine the “Fixintas.” Re-read those things each time you add to or check off your Fixinta items. Make time to Cut and Paste from this list to you current to-do list. Do.

6. Find the courage to dare to do. (Not just any kind of courage, on the kind of courage in the following poem: The Hill, By Nissim Ezekiel)

7. Develop the discipline to keep doing. Here is the step that I still struggle with. Maybe I'll revisit this post one day when I figure this one out.

I write this long post on the folly of the Fixintas because I have a bad case of them and I constantly struggle to overcome them. Until recently, my pride-fear paired with my fauma have me looking back on a life full of shoulda’s, woulda’s, and coulda’s. Lucky for me, I still have my youth. I can still change my non-ways and one-day contribute as I continue to appreciate. For me, this is just the first step. Stay tuned for the next; I’ll need you there as I need you here.

And You…out there; if your still with me; if you feel me; how do you avoid the in-the-rut-“Groundhog-Day” existence of your life? What is your passion? How do you make a difference?

Do More Now,

- Not Just Another Dog Named Tag