Hello Proprocrastinator.

It sounds like your wheels feel like they are spinning, and you needed a place to let some of it out. Welcome to youthspace — I’m glad you came to share your thoughts.

I’ve never heard of the idea of cowpaths before, but I can see why it’s such a compelling metaphor for the way that we sometimes live our lives. From what I can gather, you’re feeling somewhat like you’re stuck in a cowpath yourself… but you’re a smart enough cow to see the path, and realize that you could walk over where the tree used to be…and that part of what’s frustrating you is your inability to do so, even though you see it for what it is? I would imagine you feel trapped by the paths that you see but cannot break out of…

Frustration seems to be a theme in your writing here – and I can hear that you are very angry with yourself for not being able to grab control of the parts of your life that you feel are spiraling. Even more than that, there seems to be nervousness in your words that things are getting much worse than they normally are, and that perhaps they’re starting to escape your control. You’re looking at yourself, and seeing that things that would usually motivate you (like having a girl over) don’t have as much power as they normally do, and it sounds like it generally has you wondering if something bigger than the cowpath phenomenon is causing you to fall back into habits that you don’t like to see yourself in?

You talk about loving the idea and theory of organizing your life, but feeling paralyzed when you actually try to make those thoughts into realities….which feeds into the feelings of irritation. Have there been moments in the past where you were able to beat that paralysis?

I’m worried for you Proprocrastinator, being stuck in this paralysis. I know you’re waiting to talk to a therapist but if you want to explore other resources and options we can work with you on that.

We are here to listen and talk if you want to keep sharing your reflections on your experiences. If you’re in Canada, you can also try out the live chat between 6 and 11pm PST (or 6pm-midnight on Friday and Saturday).

-The Support Team

Hey Pro,

Humans are very strange things indeed. If you ever truly figure them out, please let us know, okay? Because I know how it is to look at your own behaviour and find that you can’t make heads or tails of it.

And it sounds like you’re continuing to wonder at yourself, not only “why did I do that?” but also “I just know I’m going to do that again”. I can hear that part of your frustration comes from seeing that you’re likely to put things off again and again, in the same way that you have before. What you said at the end of your message made it sound like you’re running on a treadmill, trying to deal with your anger at yourself from things that you have let slide in the past, all the while fighting to keep from falling off of the stuff that is still coming at you.

I can imagine that the exam tomorrow might be pressing down on you pretty heavily today…because it sounds like even though you know it’s worth a lot of your grade, you’ve been simply unable to make yourself care about it, even though you want to. It sounds like your mind is running around in circles trying to sort itself out, as the minutes pass by that you could be using to study. I can imagine how aggravating that is. Know that we’re here if you want to talk about how the studying and exam go for you.

It’s great that you have dance to keep you sane — dancing can be a very feel-good thing to do, and I can tell that it’s important to you.

-The Support Team