Avoidance, Procrastination & Other Sacred Arts

This week’s share is… late.

Or maybe I am.

Or maybe time is just an illusion. (Manyphilosopherss would agree.)

The truth is, I’ve been thinking about this topic while doing everything except writing about it. You could say I’ve been… researching. (Not procrastinating!)

It turns out there’s a subtle art to the ways we don’t do things. And it’s not all the same:

Procrastination is the elegant act of delay, masked as business with other activities. This often looks like a completed checklist of re-arranging my entire wardrobe in a new color-coded system while leaving my website development undone.
Avoidance is more like an emotional dodge — ignoring or hiding from the importance of something uncomfortable. For me, that’s often conflict. I’m far more at ease in the role of diplomat or peace-maker.
Lateness. Sometimes circumstantial. Sometimes habitual. Sometimes… existential. Ironically, this is often due to my finally getting in flow with something I've procrastinated and now don't want to stop doing. Go figure.

I’ve danced with all three partners for most of my life. Lately, though, I’m paying more attention. Rather than falling into guilt or shame, I’m getting curious.

Buddhist psychology reminds us that what we call resistance often points to something tender underneath — fear, fatigue, perfectionism, or uncertainty. Rather than push through, the invitation is to pause and ask: What’s here? What might this delay be protecting?

For me, I’m often drawn to the bright, the new, the collaborative, the creative. As things shift into the routine or the habitual, I can lose interest — and lose sight of how steady effort is what actually sustains the things that matter most.

Last week, I shared about the hindrance of sloth and torpor, that lethargy that can come from avoidance, but there’s another trap: striving. “I have to get this right, do more, go faster,”

That effort of striving can often drive me right into the arms of one of those dance partners.

Then it’s helpful to turn to my favorite Alan Watts, who reminds us:

“The meaning of life is just to be alive.”

Not to be on time, efficient, or optimized. Just here.

So this week, I’m bowing to the wisdom inside the delay. I’m noticing the part of me that hides, the one that hopes things will right (or write) themselves, and the one that’s learning to show up anyway — late, imperfect, real. Maybe your own delays carry a little wisdom too.

Here’s to your slow returns, mindful meanderings, and the sacred art of showing up, just as you are.