Confessions of a Procrastinator

Abstract

This text was never intended to be published. It chronicles a useless detour. Reading it may very well turn out to be a useless detour. Or more precisely rather than being useless in the sense that you, the reader, necessarily will find no relevance or have no benefit from reading the text, it is useless in that particular sense that all sociological and psychological detours are, that is, intrinsically un-purposeful at the outset: They are not an instrumental tool; they have no predetermined goal; they have no predetermined outcome. As opposed to material detours, that are often paved or tarmacked beforehand leading to a fixed endpoint, this specific kind of detours are per definition unplanned and uncontrolled. They have no deliberate use. In fact, we can only categorize these detours properly the moment we are no longer detouring but once again back on track. Until that moment, we are merely derailed. And only then can we determine its value. Defining a detour’s usefulness is thus a retrospective endeavor. Consequently, detouring may never become a useful, instrumental imperative. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2022 APA, all rights reserved)