Congratulations! Well done to those of you who have got your scripts submitted in time for the Regular deadline. You can now put your feet up and relax— or better still, start something new— next year’s competition will be here before you know it. And as you are almost certainly diligent souls you will want to use your time constructively.

As an added bonus for your impressive aptitude, you can also stop reading this blog… just for this week, of course… it’s a temporary reprieve only. Please do come back next week.

But I’m afraid this week’s topic is not for you… it’s for us less organised mortals. Those of us who, despite all advice offered, still crammed for exams, ate that last chocolate biscuit or can’t find the time to do enough exercise. No really, stop reading! Please just go and do something more useful.

[BEAT]

OK now all the goody-two-shoes, never-miss-a-deadline writers have departed, let’s crack on with this week’s blog topic.

What are we writing about again? Oh yes, Procrastination.

That sounds like a weighty subject, I’ll need a cup of tea first? Give me a second….

[Three hours later…]

Sorry about that, who knew my fridge needed defrosting? It’s lucky I noticed. It’s good to get that little activity out of the way, though. It really needed doing….

Where were we? Oh yes, the art of procrastination. The perfect topic for those of us who fully intended to meet the Regular deadline, but well never quite got round to it, but will definitely meet the next deadline,
no really… it’s in hand… There is another deadline right, one after this deadline? The Final Deadline… great, oh there’s another one too? What’s the final final deadline, deadline? What’s that called? “I Missed the Deadline”, deadline. Very apt. When’s that? April 13th. Before Midnight? CST or EST? Yep, no worries, then— there’s loads of time. Ages and ages. I can start this afternoon, evening, tomorrow, the weekend…

But we shouldn’t joke, as there is a real art to procrastination. It is not an activity that should be taken too lightly. It’s a deft skill to be learned, honed and perfected. It’s really not for the faint-hearted. There is a rigorous training required session, “Wax on, wax off” levels of dedication… that will of course, commence tomorrow.

Indeed, this topic shouldn’t be rushed. It’s too important. Let me take another brief pause. Let’s do some research. Although, it’s de rigueur these days, I don’t want to be accused of spreading misinformation. Just give me an hour or two. I’ll do a bit of googling. I want to consult some experts…

[Four days later…]

Wow, that Tik-Tok is addictive isn’t it?

But yes, interesting. Really interesting. Procrastination must be treated seriously. That’s what the scientists think too.

As dedicated scribes, we cannot spend our time simply being lazy, or idle. That’s no good. That’s amateur level antics, and we aspire to be professionals— besides pure indolence comes with way too much guilt.

As skilled lollygaggers we should spend our time in pursuit of activities that are partially related to the task in hand, but do not actually move our scripts forward. That’s the central tenant of skilled delayers. Our distractions must be relevant to writing, but must not under any circumstances, involve putting words on an actual page.

The internet is of course perfect for us types. A source of infinite inspiration to avoid perspiration. But I find when I want to write a screenplay, the best act of procrastination is to watch movies. Loads of them. As many as you can squeeze in…

[Searches for ‘Movies about Procrastination’]

There are so many! But I love this movie. It’s definitely one of my favourite procastination movies: Wes Anderson’s wonderful Rushmore. Max, our hero (of sorts), is a Picasso-level procrastinator. His efforts to avoid the academic work required to get him through school are monumental! Hours and hours of productive activity designed to self-sabotage his own goals… but somehow are also adjacent to his desire to not get expelled from school. Genius level dither.

Indeed, I think I should re-watch it now…

[93 minutes later…]

Oh yes, it is wonderful. So many creative ways to avoid studying: networking, reading, obsessive love (that’s a risky option, I admit), politics (also fraught with danger), psychological manipulation of others (not one I would recommend personally), shopping and of course, creative writing!

I love how one of Max’s acts of time-wasting is to write plays. Writing as a form of procrastination. Now that’s genius levels of psychological self-engineering.

Eureka! That gives me an idea. If you are one of those disciplined types— and let’s be honest you never did stop reading at the end of the first paragraph did you, then your objective is just write. You are fine. Simple.

But perhaps if you are prone to a bit of distraction from the noisy, chaotic modern world, then maybe switch your plan to not writing. Tell your brain you aren’t going to do any scribbling today. Your goal is to avoid bashing that keyboard to form poetic words and deeds— at all costs. Maybe then too, like Rushmore’s Max, you will convince yourself to use screenwriting as the best way to avoid not writing. There’s a logic there, I think…

Give it a try. See if it works for you. Wait for the weekend though. There’s no time to start like some undetermined moment in the future.

Happy #WW. Get writing or not writing! Whatever strategy works best for you to get your words on a page…

A reminder that the Final deadline is March 23rd.