Accept the Fact That Maybe You’re Just Lazy
Stop using the word “lazy” as a pejorative.
--
Self-help writers love to reassure us that we’re not lazy. Maybe you’re afraid, and that fear is paralyzing you from action. Maybe you’re understimulated, which leaves you unmotivated. Maybe you’re suffering from the pandemic doldrums, making you exhausted from self-isolation.
Procrastinating my work, as I frequently and lazily do, I read all those stories with a niggling sense of unease. None of them really fit me. I am motivated. I am perfectly stimulated. I’m not particularly afraid. And yet, I frequently prefer not to work even when I can. If I can skip work to instead read, swim, eat or play video games, I will.
I began to worry if I was actually, secretly, horribly lazy. I took a super scientific quiz to determine if I was lazy — featuring questions like “do you prefer a hot, long bath, or a quick shower?” and “how many hours do you sleep on average?” — and received the devastating result:
I wallowed (maybe even lazily) in pity. Then I thought: why is that such a bad thing?
Here’s the truth: sometimes I postpone work until tomorrow because I just don’t feel like doing it today. You know why? Because I prefer to do fun stuff, and frankly I don’t believe that’s a moral failing on my part.
I’m sick of laziness being treated like a huge character flaw or weakness in my personality. I’m lazy. I’m not ashamed of it. And you shouldn’t be, either.
Society versus science
When I googled “scientific research laziness,” I chanced upon this quote from an article in Science Daily investigating why people will persist in lazily lazing about, instead of exercising as they’re told by society and government initiatives.
“The research findings, published recently in Neuropsychologia, suggest that our brains may simply be wired to prefer lying on the couch [instead of exercising].” (Cue my fake shocked face.)
