Have you ever noticed your behavior when toilet paper is in abundance?
In particular, how much of it you use when you conclude your bathroom-using experience? (The cleanest way I can come up with saying it at the moment).
Now, think about a time when there were only three squares left on the roll.
You pretty much have three choices.
1. Call out for assistance. Which is slightly embarrassing...especially in a public restroom.
2. Do the walk of shame to find the closest T.P. stash, hoping you can get back to safety before someone notices.
3. Exercise all your creativity to make those three squares and anything else in grabbing distance work for your unique situation.
We tend to use things copiously (and perhaps wastefully) when it's in abundance.
It's the same thing with summer. Summer should be a wonderful opportunity to make progress on something. It could be playing a musical instrument (wink, wink). But, it could also be taking up a new hobby. Maybe developing a skill for work or pleasure.
But, here's how summer often plays out.
June 15th: All right, I have three months of summer to work on my piano skills! This is going to be awesome.
July 15th: Okay, well, it was a busy spring and I deserved some time off. I still have two months to go. Let's do this!!
August 15th: Well, that month passed by in a blink. But hey, it's summer. There's still a month left to go. Let's finish strong!
September 15th: Crap...
This is due to Parkinson's Law, which states that humans will naturally fill up allotted time with work.
If your boss gives you a year to complete a project, you'll take a year to do it.
If your boss gives you six months to complete a project, you'll do it in six months.
So, why couldn't you do it in six months even if you have a year?]
Welcome to the human condition.
Just like toilet paper - if we have a lot of it, we'll burn through it at a rapid pace.
For the three months of summer, we will burn through that, too. Except, procrastination can also fill up that time. We can blink, and it will be over.
It's an opportunity to enter fall a new person, or start the fall with some catching up to do.
So.
What will you do this summer?