The 'Last-minute' syndrome

Mr X: You just can’t turn creativity like a faucet. You have to be in the right mood.
Mr Y: What mood is that?
Mr X: Last-minute panic.

I often find myself trying to wriggle out of this ‘last-minute panic’ situation and sometimes end up botching things. And it is quickly followed by adrenaline rushes, a fluttering heart, bountiful amounts of sweat and a realisation ‘Oh shit, I am late, I need to do it now’! For instance, I have been itching to write this piece for quite sometime back, but I kept putting it off until my dad, one fine day, asked me with a giggle, “Hey Pressy, did you finally get into a right mood to finish that article of yours?” I could feel the tinge of sarcasm in his voice and wished that I could blithely do a ‘Ctrl+Alt+delete’ in my memory. But the cursed thing preyed on my mind for days and I eventually decided to get into that ‘Just Do It’ mode to pen down this piece of mine.

Purists term this ‘last-minute’ syndrome as procrastination or the art of postponing things till the eleventh hour and the raging epidemic is known to take a toll on many young people who are in the prime of their lives. There is an unappeasable feeling of a short-term reprieve that comes with dodging arduous tasks. (Some may be not that taxing). You must have realized by now that I am no exception when it comes to holding off things. Whether it has been my homework or housework , (my professional work can be discounted as the aftereffects of putting things off can be quite deadly), I hardly recall that these things have been done in a composed and calculated manner. And then I discover myself frantically devising means and ways to grapple with the undesired situation.

My electricity had been cut off, not due to paucity of funds but due to lack of my remembrance to pay the bill that has been sitting on the desk for weeks. My height of procrastination came to the fore, when I picked my telephone to call the electric company only to discover that the phone has been shut off too.
Yes, the list of my procrastinating tales is ceaseless and it would not be out of place to say that I am a professional procrastinator. My father, a strict task-master, told me to renew my passport owing to some urgent official requirement. I delayed it for so long only to realize that the last date for submitting the required documents came in a jiffy. No wonder, I was at the receiving end of my father’s fury and I soon found myself in a headless chicken mode, running from pillar to post to get the damn thing done.

I am sure, just like me, the small world is teeming with procrastinators. So I ask you-Does it only affect people like me or is it an all-encompassing disorder? And what does one do about it? And yes, please don’t procrastinate to answer the above queries of mine.