Underlying Motives that Drive Procrastination

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Reference: What are the psychological origins of procrastination?

While the explanations in this article make really good sense - i.e. procrastination has roots in what we value, what we believe, and what we are keen to do - there may also be underlying, not-so-apparent, maybe unconscious motives or emotions that drive procrastination.

So for each of us, or for those we may be trying to help, we must vet these explanations vis-a-vis a self-reflection, self-exploration, or self-discovery about what is truly underlying ours or others' difficulties to get things done.

This requires suspending, to begin with, the assumption, judgment or conclusion that it is something as pejorative as procrastination. Our mind, body and spirit may be telling us that what we're trying to do is meaningless and that our meaning or purpose lies somewhere else.

And this may not be so logical or rational!

Brain Capacity for Change

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On the one hand, this:

Although it took several decades, Merzenich and Bach-y-Rita were to help prove that Cajal and the scientific consensus were wrong. The adult brain was plastic. It could rewire itself, sometimes radically.

On the other hand, this, too:

It’s perhaps understandable why crazy levels of hope are raised when people read tales of apparently miraculous recovery from brain injury that feature people seeing again, hearing again, walking again and so on. These dramatic accounts can make it sound as ifanything is possible.

~Will Storr
The brain's miracle superpowers of improvement

So while our brain capacity for change or growth is far from zero, it is not infinite, either.

Tripartite Model: "What is art?"

The Tripartite Model reframe of the perennial question "What is art?"

First, I argue that it's actually multiple questions, not simply one:

Rational | analytical, logical, quantitative

How do you define art? What is the nature of art? What are its characteristics? How do you create art?

Non-rational | creative, intuitive, qualitative

How do you experience art? What does art mean to you personally? What emotions does art evoke in you?

Meta-rational | spiritual, philosophical, metaphysical

What is the purpose of art? What does art even exist? How does God, religion, or transcendence figure into art?

Second, I argue that each of us contributes to answering the multi-faceted question of "What is art?" and that only as a collective can we truly find its equally multi-faceted answer.

Theory of Knowledge: What is art?

What is art?

It's that question that often preoccupies me, not just in viewing all sorts of artwork in front of me, but also in creating whatever sort of art catches my fancy.

In this mini-lecture, the speaker identifies three aspects or parameters of what is art:

(1) The intentionality of the artist
(2) The quality of the art, the skill of the artist
(3) The response of the audience

It's a thoughtful, engaging little lecture, one where the speaker offers his viewpoints to us yet also asks us numerous questions.

Ra Paulette shapes New Mexico sandstone

Lee Cowan: "Do you think you're obsessed with cave digging?" 

Ra Paulette: "Would you call a child being obsessed with play?"

Jen Jen Reynolds posted the above video and the following notes:

In the high desert of Northern New Mexico, you can hear the sounds of a man entranced in his work underground in a cave. You will see a small entry that opens into a cavern, where Ra Paulette has spent the last 25 years carving New Mexico’s sandstone into magnificent art. He’s spent years doing this work with the company of only his dog. 

When asked if he is a man obsessed with cave digging, he gives the really thoughtful response: “Is a child obsessed with play?” He waxes on to say, that when you love what you are doing, you are driven to do it all the time. He sees his majestic pieces as environmental projects; his goal is to inspire people such that they open up emotionally, in response to the enormity and power of what his carvings evoke. 

It can be said that he has created magic in the underground caves that he has carved. They are at once intimate and overwhelming. Interestingly, Ra doesn’t see himself as an artist, but simply as a man expressing his sense of wonder in a passionate way. I would beg to differ with his opinion that he is not an artist. What he has created, is livable art of unbelievable power. 

The video you are about to watch tells the rest of his story, and gives you a tour of his magnificent caves. Unbelievably, his work had no notoriety until a filmmaker asked to do a documentary about Ra. Called “Cave Digger”, the film ended up winning an academy award! Please share your reactions to this story of peaceful man who’s purpose was a dedication to his craft. I can guarantee that you are about to view something you have never seen before.

I was taken by how Ra Paulette had dedicated his life to art:

I used to love rock-climbing, because I loved the feel of the mountain on my hands and fingers. It was a way to get intimate with it. That's also how I see Paulette's love for what he does: just his hands, and some low-tech or non-tech tools, and the sandstone. In a way the question about obsession was silly and dense.

Then, it's overwhelming in that his work is literally towering, even otherworldly - maybe a scene from one of the "Alien" films. Overwhelming in that he has devoted years and years of his life to his art; and I do hope he has more than plenty of life left to finish his magnum opus!

Finally, I bet he and Georgia O'Keeffe would've gotten along famously, maybe even become lovers. She, too, loved the New Mexico landscape.

Sonmi-451 on Knowledge, Death and Life