Bo 5786: Explanation of Procrastination

GOOD MORNING! Growing up, my father would impress upon my siblings and me the importance of always having a question to think about. He’d often remind us, “A person’s mind should never be empty, you should always have a problem to solve; your mind should always be preoccupied with an intelligent question.” He would also hold us accountable by often asking us to share with him something that we had been thinking about.

My father wasn’t merely referring to questions like, “Why is the sky blue?” or “Why don’t ships sink in the water?” He preferred us to have a Torah or Jewish philosophy related question to contemplate. In my father’s worldview, everything and every concept had a logical reason behind it, and uncovering the “whys” of Judaism would give us a deeper and more meaningful connection to it. Of course, this process naturally led us to seek a deeper understanding of just about everything. Interestingly enough, my father had intuited a psychological phenomenon known as the Zeigarnik Effect.

Bluma Zeigarnik, a Jewish Russian psychologist, studied at the University of Berlin under famed behavioral psychologist Kurt Lewin. Lewin had a habit of meeting with his students at the café across the street from the school. One day they noticed a fascinating peculiarity of human nature; waiters could remember complicated orders only as long as the orders were in process of being served. Once the order was served and paid for, the waiters remembered very little of it.

Zeigarnik hypothesized that it is far easier for people to remember incomplete tasks than those that have already been completed. She confirmed these findings in a series of experiments. In one of her experiments, Zeigarnik asked a group of 138 children to complete a series of simple tasks, puzzles, and arithmetic problems. She allowed the children to complete half of the tasks and interrupted them during the remaining tasks. Zeigarnik investigated their recall after an hour’s delay and discovered 110 of the 138 children had better recall for the interrupted tasks than the completed tasks. In a related experiment involving adults, the participants were able to recall unfinished tasks 90% better than completed tasks.

It seems that the mind experiences some sort of cognitive tension that arises from having an unfinished task as it needs to keep the task in mind in order to eventually complete it and release this internal tension. This concept of having the mind, and even the subconscious, actively engaged with a problem is what my father was referring to when he said that a person’s mind should never be empty.

The Zeigarnik Effect is also the bane of those who are habitual procrastinators – the ones who put the word “pro” into procrastinate. People who habitually avoid doing something either because it is uncomfortable or out of plain old laziness are really just continually clouding their mind with unfinished tasks. After a while it begins to severely hamper their ability to properly focus and complete other tasks. Soon they are psychologically overwhelmed and get “stuck.”

Over the years I have heard many people say, “I work really well under pressure.” More often than not, they are actually revealing a very important element of their personality; that they tend to put off important tasks and they only complete them in a deadline induced frenzy. It reminds me of what Bill Watterson (creator of the comic strip Calvin and Hobbes) once said; “You can’t just turn on creativity like a faucet. You have to be in the right mood. What mood is that? Last-minute panic!”

Of course, this week’s Torah portion has a relevant message on this topic.

“And you shall guard the matzot [...]” (Exodus 12:17).

When the Jewish people were about to leave Egypt, the Almighty instructed Moses to inform the Jewish people on the preparations they were to make. This included items like preparing the Paschal lamb and eating it with bitter herbs and unleavened bread – aka matzot (plural of matzah).

The great Biblical commentator Rashi explains (ad loc) that “guarding the matzot” means being very meticulous in their preparation in order to prevent them from becoming chametz (leavened). The process of leavening is that of the dough “souring” – in Hebrew the word for sour is chamutz and sour wine (i.e. vinegar) is called “chometz” (the “o” is pronounced like the “o” in the word dough).

Rashi goes on to quote the midrash (Mechilta Bo, parsha 9), “Rabbi Yoshia says – Do not read the word ‘matzot’ rather read it ‘mitzvot’ (although vowelized differently, the word matzot is spelled exactly the same as mitzvot). Thus, the verse in the Torah takes on an added meaning; just as the Jewish people are commanded to not allow the matzot to become chametz (by delaying the process to completion), so too they shouldn’t allow mitzvot to become ‘leavened.’ Rather, if an opportunity to do a mitzvah presents itself, do it immediately.”

In other words, just as we have to be meticulous in our process of preparing dough to become matzot (by eliminating all unnecessary delay), so too must we have the same attitude of immediacy toward fulfilling mitzvot.

Yet the analogy seems flawed; if one delays doing a mitzvah, he can do it a little later or, at the very worst, he lost an opportunity. But if one fails to prepare the dough for matzot properly, he has created a far worse situation: he now has chametz on his hands, which on Passover is a serious transgression. How are these two ideas analogous?

Generally, people delay or push off doing things they wish to avoid doing. Procrastination is rarely a problem of time management or planning. People simply delay doing things they don’t want to do. Even when they get around to finally doing the task they often do it half-heartedly.

A classic example: If we ask our children to clean up their room, even if they finally acquiesce, getting them to actually do it is often a battle. Imagine if after finally getting them to pick up their room we then ask them to set the table, and after dinner clear and wash the dishes. Pretty soon they will resent doing these things and begin to object.

More often than not this is because the children perceive their parents’ attitude towards them as some variation of indentured servitude and they view it as a loss of autonomy. However, if a parent takes the time to properly explain why they need them to do the task at hand and the children feel that they are being dealt with as a junior partner, then they may see the value in chores and can even begin to accept responsibility for the greater whole.

Unfortunately, even as adults we can fall into the same rut when it comes to doing mitzvot. If one perceives mitzvot to be onerous obligations instead of what they truly are – amazing opportunities for personal growth in so many ways – then he will soon begin to resent doing them. This feeling of loss of independence inexorably leads to procrastination, like a child delaying cleaning his room.

Because the easiest way to free our minds from the Zeigarnik Effect is to remove any responsibility of actually completing the task, eventually those delays will become noncompliance, which leads to non-observance. The most common way to relieve oneself of that “guilt” is by beginning to believe that there is no responsibility to fulfill certain mitzvot. Thus, by delaying the mitzvot we are actually revealing our attitude towards them.

Similar to the household chores, when we obligate our children to pray, say blessings, observe Shabbat, and other mitzvot without properly educating them as to why they are doing these actions, we are actually well on our way to getting them to resent doing mitzvot. In other words, we are on the derech to pushing them “off the derech” – we are on the “path” to pushing them “off the proper path.”

As discussed in previous columns, God doesn’t need our prayers or for us to follow His precepts. They are given to us for our sake – so that we may grow and experience the most meaningful and fulfilling lives.

But in order to achieve this we must first understand what the mitzvot are all about and find meaning in them. Once we understand them ourselves, we can begin to slowly educate and show our children that mitzvot are really opportunities. Our sages even give us a process for this – we are instructed to incentivize them every step of the way. Soon they will see for themselves that studying Torah and doing mitzvot are rewarding. The Talmud (Pesachim 50b) teaches us, “Metoch shelo lishma ba lishma – if one begins by doing things for a selfish reason, he will eventually come to do it for the proper reason.”

Taking some time to contemplate prayers and their meaning, a person soon realizes how meaningful it is to begin the day with a conversation with the Almighty. There are very few mitzvot that aren’t accessible to the emotions or intellect. This is what our sages mean when they tell us that we should not delay fulfilling mitzvot. We should perceive every mitzvah as an opportunity for ourselves; not merely as something we have to do.

Bo, Exodus 10:1 - 13:16

This week we conclude the ten plagues with the plagues of locusts, darkness, and the death of the first-born. The laws of Passover are presented, followed by the commandment to wear tefillin, consecrate the first-born animal, and redeem one’s first born son. The Torah tells us that, at some time in the future, your son will ask you about these commandments and you will answer: “With a show of power, God brought us out of Egypt, the place of slavery. When Pharaoh stubbornly refused to let us leave, God killed all the first-born in Egypt, man and beast alike. I, therefore, offer to God all male first-born (animals) and redeem all the first-born of sons. And it shall be a sign upon your arm, and an ornament between your eyes (tefillin), for with a strong hand the Almighty removed us from Egypt” (Exodus 13:15).