The roots#
A few thoughts on the origins of procrastination.
A journey to Mount Celeste#
Warning
This section contains important spoilers on the game Celeste.
In 2018, an Indy game was released named Celeste, and is in my humble opinion an absolute masterpiece. Celeste is what is called a platform game, that is a distant descendant of Super Mario Bros. Celeste is also a hard game, and by hard I mean wickedly, wickedly hard. The story is set in a Mountain, called Mount Celeste, and the main character, named Madeline - you, decided to climb Mountain Celeste. Her motivation for attempting the climb is unclear, but she is pretty intent on doing it. As we quickly discover in the game, Madeline does suffer from pretty severe anxiety. Madeline is handicapped by her inner struggles, but she is also courageous and starts climbing the mountain, alone. In the first scene, Madeline meets a bird who delivers a powerful message to her: you can do this.
Fig. 2 Madeline and her inner self. Fan-art by GomiGomiPomi reproduced with permission from the author (Usage of my drawings is allowed as long as proper credits are given and it’s not for commercial purposes).#
Fairly early in the game, Madeline runs into a most peculiar incident. She finds a spooky mirror, and her reflection jumps out of the mirror and starts attacking her. Madeline just met her inner self. But she does not know yet what she is dealing with. The first instinct of Madeline is to fight back her inner self. She hurts her. She runs away for her. Like literally, because it is a video game, and the inner self jumped out of the mirror, so it is actually possible. And the inner self fights back, because the inner self does not want to climb Mount Celeste.
This conflict between Madeline and her inner self eventually culminates into a full blown panic attack. Madeline will need to practice a breathing exercise, masterfully incarnated as a side-game where the players controls a feather in the wind, in order to regain her footing. Madeline makes very little progress climbing Mount Celeste while fighting her inner self like that.
Madeline will eventually start talking to her inner self. She will come to realize how scared, and how insecure her inner self is. Instead of silencing and avoiding her inner self, she will listen to her, encourage her, and work with her. Once again, this process is incarnated inside the game with beautiful play scenes where the player needs to control both Madeline and her inner self collaborating to complete levels. This last bit does not matter for what I have to say about procrastination, but I just wanted to emphasize once more how much of a gem this game truly is.
Eventually, Madeline completes every level, and reaches the summit of the mountain. The mountain is an obvious metaphor for any kind of hard projects. And you, too, can do this. Chances are, your journey may look a lot like Madeline’s.
Meet my spirit animal#
Freud made one thing clear: humans are not rationale creatures. Our emotions and our subconscious drive our decisions as much, possibly more, than our intellect. Freud proposed to distinguish the ego - which is who we consciously perceive to be - from the id - an aggregate of instincts and emotions. My ongoing theory is that the id is not just instincts and impulses, but better conceived as an independent entity, very much like Madeline’s inner self, with a will and personality of their own. Some indigenous cultures incorporated the idea of a spirit animal, which would guard over and represent the core of an individual. Although I may not fully comprehend what spirit animals represent in indigenous cultures, I like this image a lot, so from here onward I will speak of spirit animal rather than the id, or the inner self.
In the past couple of years I have grown to know my spirit animal quite a bit. Really it has been with me all my life. I like to think that I am a rather kind, compassionate individual - I do not like conflict and I like to help people around me. So I say yes to many things. By contrast, my spirit animal is quite bad ass. It is very, very hard to force my spirit animal to do anything it does not really want to do. And when confronted with behaviors that upset them, they can be ruthless. Something I came to realize is that in many instances, my spirit animals takes over. They got me out of countless bad commitments, and helped me in very tough situations, like when I had to handle cases of misconduct and harassment around me. I am so grateful my spirit animal is here with me. But in countless situations, my spirit animal has also been a huge pain in the butt. Whenever we disagree, they generally have the final (silent) word[1], and I end up procrastinating.
So, as I mentioned in the introduction, that little theory of mine on spirit animals and procrastination is half baked. I do not pretend that the relationship between people and their spirit animals is the main cause, or even a cause, of all procrastination. I am sure there are people out there whose executive functions are simply impaired, preventing them to go through the steps necessary to complete tasks. But in my case, and several I have observed around me, procrastination clearly reflects a lack of communication between themselves and their spirit animals. Let me give you some personal examples.
Example 1: F***, I procrastinated the party
A friend of mine wants me to go to a bar for drinks with his friends. I reluctantly say yes. My spirit animal does not like groups, and I don’t really know the friends of that friend. So my spirit animal says no. But they don’t talk, and I don’t hear them, or I choose to ignore them. When time comes to go to the party, my spirit animal decides to stay home - after all, they never committed to this. Stuck in the same body as my spirit animal, I delay the time to go up until it is too late to go.
Example 2: F***, I procrastinated the email
I receive an email requesting to give a seminar as part of a course. Teaching is my duty, and the person making the request is a friend, so I want to say yes. But I am not familiar with the subject, and the period of the seminar is not convenient. My spirit animal is having none of it, they say no. So I am stuck between my “yes” and my spirit animal’s no. I do not respond to the email. I instead put it on my to-do list, to “think about it”. That item will never get done, but will stay on my to-do list for months, up to the point I either receive several reminders - in which case I eventually respond yes and wait to the very last minute to prepare - or so much time has passed that it is more embarrassing to respond than not to respond. I then finally remove the item from my to-do list.
They are many other things beyond emails and parties which I procrastinate thanks to my spirit animal, some quite more serious than that. But I think you got the general idea.
Meet your spirit animal#
If you feel that you could improve your relationship with your spirit animal, there are a few tricks that can help.
Talking to yourself (weird but works)
My favorite approach is to talk to myself - and yes it does look and sound really weird. I generally try to either walk or bike to work, and there are long sections where I am alone. I can then comfortably talk to my spirit animal. Most often, they do not respond. But I can guess what their response is, most of the times. Sometimes, the spirit animal takes over my inner speech, and actually talks (but with my voice, if that makes sense and is not too spooky). When it talks, all the spirit animal often has to say is a bunch of very negative things, or insult me. Sometimes, but rarely, the spirit animal talks to say that they are excited about something. In any case, and whether they decide to speak or not, it always feels good when the spirit animal gets to vent a bit.
Asking the hard questions (a good habit)
I sometimes try to directly engage with my spirit animal on problematic items of my to-do list. If I am lucky, I may be able to uncover the reason behind the procrastination. Maybe I don’t know where to start, and working on carving up subtasks can help address that. Maybe there is a good reason for my spirit animal to disagree with me on the task. I may change my mind after paying attention to what they have to say, or feel. Maybe my spirit animal is afraid of the implications of the task (for example submitting an application which may get rejected) or overwhelmed. Bonding with them for a while can help calm them down and regain focus.
Meditate (hard)
Another way to connect with your spirit animal is meditation. In a way, meditation is a window opened in your spirit animal. But it is possible to direct your meditation specifically towards the inside, and try to feel how your spirit animal is doing. This is quite scary and hard. I have only managed to do it a few times.
Do something for yourself (easy and fun)
Sometimes to really get something done on your to-do list, you will need to step back and not work on your to-do list. Just do something that brings your joy. This is likely something your spirit animal likes too. This is a great opportunity for bonding, and will give you energy to attack hard tasks.
Warning
This next one is not really a trick to develop a relationship with your spirit animal, but rather an observation and possibly a warning. I have noticed a few people I know who seem to have fused with their spirit animal. They have no trouble saying “no” and need to act immediately when they have something to do. They are quite effective, but also sometimes ruffle feathers around them. I don’t think it is something you can decide to do, and I am not sure fully fusing with your spirit animal is necessarily desirable, unless it is something like a fluffy bunny. I would rather establish a friendly connection with my spirit animal than fully fuse with them.
You can do this#
Let’s finish on one last massive spoiler on the game Celeste. The main developer of the game, Madeline Thorson, is a transgender woman and the story behind mount Celeste, although of universal appeal, was born out of the journey of her transition.
Over time, if you develop a bond with your spirit animal, you may get quite good at understanding them, and you two may become quite close. This may help you make decisions in a much more plain, deliberate way. And maybe this will help you not to procrastinate, and even bring much bigger changes too.
No matter what your spirit animal is, and whatever is the mountain that you wish to climb, remember: you can do this.