You’ve probably already come across the idea of “procrasticleaning”—the act of cleaning up your desk, room, or immediate surroundings instead of doing actual work. In fact, you’ve probably been guilty of procrastincleaning at some point in the last month or so. Rather than confronting the task that needs to be done, we find seemingly productive things to do, like organizing old files, cleaning up our inbox, or throwing out the trash.
Our minds can get pretty creative when it comes to making excuses to avoid work—so much, in fact, that a new form of procrastination has emerged: it’s called procrastibaking, and it’s become quite the popular hashtag on Instagram.
Unless your office happens to have a well-equipped kitchen, a well-stocked pantry, and understanding co-workers who will not question your midday baking escapades, procrastibaking isn’t something you can do as a corporate employee; this new breed of productive slackers can usually be found at home, perhaps, studying for an exam, doing freelance work, telecommuting, or other jobs that give them the luxury of working from the comforts of home.
How does it count as procrastinating, exactly? Well, it’s sort of similar to the Pomodoro Technique. Because baking involves various steps which require down time (ex. waiting for dough to rise), procrastibakers can compartmentalize their work in between these breaks, giving them a false sense of efficiency.
Note: Going out to buy ingredients from the grocery defeats the purpose of procrastibaking—that implies that you’re proactively baking, which is totally not the case. Procrastibaking is all about feeling like you haven’t abandoned the real work you have to do because you’re technically still in the “zone” of working (albeit, at the outskirts). You’re gonna get to work. Right after kneading that bread dough.
The next time you find yourself amid an important, tedious task, grab some baking pans and whatever ingredients you have on hand. Here are a few recipes to get you started on your work:
Honey banana cake
Fruit and nut power bar
Blueberry coffee cake
Happy procrastibaking!
Images from Unsplash.
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