Stress & Motivation

As I sit here, typing this post, I am well aware that there are other things that should be penned instead. I am working against a deadline of August 15th for a 5,000 word book chapter (due out in 2007). I am about a half of the way through it, yet I have known (and should have been working in it) since March.

Yet, like everything else I have ever written, I have procrastinated to the relative last minute. Over the past year, as my work load has increased, I have learned that "last minute" has broadened, instead of 3 or 4 days being acceptable, a week is now "back against the wire" last minute. But why can I not work months in advance of a deadline? Surely there is some psychology written about procrastination and productivity. Every time I think I might not make it this time, I accomplish what seems to have been the impossible. And knowing that I have yet to actually fall flat on my face putting things off till the last minute, I continue to take the (calculated) risk.

My justification has often (and is this time again) that if there is no fire under my backside, my creative and intellectual juices just aren't firing on all cylinders. I wonder, is that true? I know that it forces me to choose my words and stick with them for the lack of time - dilly-dallying trying to find the perfect word, phrase or sentence structure. It (in my opinion) avoids flowery language since I don't have the time to write poetry while toiling away on some social theory. But how much better would my work be if I took months (or three years!) to work on one project. Without distractions, other papers or articles, thesis' or extra-curricular academic activities. Would my work be better simply because I dedicated more time to it?