The habit of leaving things incomplete is a specific type of laziness and that is why we are dealing with it right after laziness. This habit may also be called careless attitude.
There are people who may not be called duly lazy, though they display specific types of laziness. One among them is leaving things incomplete. Such people may do only as much as is required to say that they’ve done a job. However, they almost always miss the finishing touch. They are happy doing the core parts of most jobs and they don’t care for polishing and furnishing. For example, one such person may complete about 80% of a project and then let it hang for a long period of time. Looking at other variations; he may complete the project in time but he may not present it in time or he may not present it in an organized manner, though the project may be good.
Looking at other examples, some of these people may cook delicious food but they may not serve it properly and they may lack finishing touch. Some others may set 2 Km run on treadmills and then stop at 1.5 or 1.6 Km or they may get off the machines when the calorie reading is 260 or 360, instead of completing 300 or 400. Some of them may decide to climb mountains but they may return from 60-70% of the way. Some others may have beautiful houses but they may not maintain them well.
Hence things may be found lying here and there, instead of being at their proper places. They may have good clothes and shoes but they may not care much about their cleanliness and conditions. They may leave some of their food items uneaten. They may often forget to carry some important things while leaving homes, like their driving licenses.
Most such people may throw their clothes here and there when they come home; instead of putting them at their proper places. Such items may keep lying here and there for some hours or even for a day or two; before they pick them up. Likewise, they may throw their shows and they may pick them up when they need them the next time.
Looking into their bathrooms; many such clothing items may be found hanging there, which have no use in bathroom. There may be some old toothbrushes, some bottles of shampoo and other such products which are old or very old. Such items may be waiting to be thrown to the bin for many months or even for years.
Looking into their kitchens, many grocery items may not be categorized and/or named properly and some of them may be found in wrong sections. Unwashed dishes may be there in sinks at such times of the day when they should not be. Some items of partly eaten food may be still lying in the kitchens; waiting to be refrigerated or thrown to the bins. Their houses may not be managed properly. Their car keys may be at wrong places, TV remotes and other remotes may be lying here and there; and they may often forget where they put their cell phones and other such items.
Such people suffer from a specific type of laziness. Due to this negative trait, they may not be dependable and that may hurt their chances of success in most spheres of life. This habit can do much damage in profession as well as relationship; as the other parties may get tired of such attitude of these people.
As one such person begins to leave things incomplete; he sends conscious signals to his subconscious mind that he likes things this way. With time and repeated acts; the subconscious may register it as a script and it may start executing it. When that happens; his subconscious may start encouraging him to do so more and more. Hence he may start hearing inner voices. Some of these voices may be like, “it’s all right to leave clothes on sofa for a while and there nothing wrong with it”, “you can wash the dishes later and there’s no hurry”, “it’s just a remote and you can put it anywhere” and many other such voices. Such voices may encourage him to leave one aspect or another of most things incomplete.
With time, this habit may grow stronger. When that happens, it may start affecting the spheres which may be important or very important like profession, relationships and health. Taking an example, if one such person is a tailor and he is stitching a suit for you, he may not deliver it in time. He may present an excuse that the suit is almost finished and only buttons and/or zips need to be done. Hence he may ask you to visit tomorrow or later. This may happen to most of his clients. With time; he may build up a reputation of being untrustworthy; and it may hurt his professional growth.
Likewise, if one such person is a car mechanic and he’s promised you to deliver your car by 5 in the evening; he may make excuses when you visit him at that time. He may tell you that the washing part or some other part is left and you should come back after some time. If one such person is a teacher, his students may complain that he skips one thing or another from every chapter. Though he may be good at teaching, he may almost always deliver less than 100%.
Likewise, such people may not bother about getting regular health checkups. Even if they find something is wrong with them; they may postpone as long as they can, before visiting doctors. Such practice may at times land them into serious health issues. After they visit doctors; they may not follow up properly and some of them may not follow up at all. They may not take their medicines regularly and they may often skip doses.
Looking at relationships; such people may often show up late for their dates and/or they may not arrange movie tickets till last moments though they may have made such plans many days ago. Likewise, they may not deposit their kids’ fees before deadlines and some of them may often pay such fees after the deadlines; with fines. When they go to markets to purchase items of daily need; they may often skip or forget some items and they may almost never purchase everything on the lists they may have. Likewise, they may deliver less than 100% in most other spheres of their lives.
All these people may be perfectly capable of delivering 100%, but they may simply not be interested due to the subconscious script of leaving things incomplete. This can make them less dependable at times and completely undependable at times.
Let’s see how this habit should be handled. Going with the basic rule, start with small changes and then build up. In most cases; you only need to put conscious efforts for changing small things and the big ones may change with time, if you’ve accomplished the first task. This is because almost everything big is made up of smaller units. If you change the units; the bigger picture is changed.
When you start with small things, your subconscious may not pose strong opposition. Hence it may be easy to do them, compared to big ones; as already discussed in the chapter named ‘Laziness’. To start with, each time you get back home, make sure you put your clothes, shoes, watch and other such items at their proper places before you take rest or do something else, like eating a meal. Change first, put things at their proper places and then do something else. These are small things but they can bring big changes.
Through these acts, you start sending signals to your subconscious that doing things in proper manner is important for you. With time, your subconscious may register such messages and this level may become easy for you. In the next level, make sure you put your car keys, TV remote as well as other remotes, your cell phone and other such items at proper places chosen by you. This way; you’ll always know where to find them when you need them. Since cell phone is a moving item; you may choose specific places for it in each room.
With time and effort, your subconscious may become fine with this level also. Hence you may not face problems while doing these things. When you reach such stage; your subconscious may encourage you to do more. It means you’re ready for the next level.
Start applying these changes to bigger spheres of your life like profession, relationships and health. You may find that you’re able to take most such things to completion, with effort and without strong resistance from your subconscious. This is because the subconscious has already replaced a part of the old script and it is in the process of replacing the rest.
Here also, don’t do too much too soon. Start with small things and then build up gradually.
Himanshu Shangari