Assignment 20 - Tahsen Hossain - How to Waste Time like Tahsen Hossain

TLDR - Say you're going to do something and then do everything except that thing for copious amounts of time


Step 1 - Decide to do something. Usually, homework or in those rare instances when you're all caught up academically, workouts.

Step 2 - Do what seems like a reasonable amount of work at the time but really isn't that much at all. Like the first half of a blog post (literally only 75 words) or 7 minutes on the treadmill at half-speed.

Step 3 - Go get yourself a drink of water from the kitchen because even the best procrastinators need to HYDRATE.

Step 4 - Forget why you were in the kitchen because you have the attention span of a literal fruit fly and check your phone for what seemed like 5 seconds but was really closer to 10 whole minutes, instead of completing Step 3 and maintaining your own health.

Step 5 - Realise that you are losing focus and try to get back on task

Step 6 - Open up the youtube tab on a device for the sole purpose of playing music while you work and nothing else. (Foreshadowing: This is what I'd like to call walking right next to the rabbit hole and expecting not to fall in.)

Step 7 - See the thumbnail of a video that you know is probably clickbait but click on it anyway because, again, you have the attention span of a hummingbird on crack cocaine. Swan dive headfirst into the rabbit hole.

Step 8 - Give up all hope of being productive and start sketching and doodling on random papers you find nearby, maybe even upgrade from Youtube to Hulu or Crunchyroll so you can catch up on some shows that you wanted to watch. If the weather is nice, take your sketchbook and your bike, go outside, find a nice spot in the shade or a park bench, and doodle there instead, while you can enjoy the breeze. Unapologetically set up camp in the rabbit hole and when the rabbit that lives there comes by, make sure there's still enough room for it to be comfortable because habit loss is no joke.

Step 9 - Look at the time and how much you didn't do and act surprised to be in the situation you're in.

Step 10 - Stress-work extra hard to get an acceptable amount of work done.

Step 11 - Feel a little guilty for wasting so much time.

Step 12 -  Realise you don't actually feel guilty at all and sleep soundly with no regrets.

Step 13 - Wake up in the middle of the night realising that you still haven't had any water all day and your mouth is as dry as the Gobi desert.

Step 14 - HYDRATE; for real this time.