Is there a cure for last-minuteness?

I’m a last-minute person, always have been. Whenever I need to get something done, I wait until the last moment. Whether it’s creating a presentation or taking out the garbage.

It’s a very annoying — and often stressful — quality. And one that I unfortunately passed on to my daughter.

“Hurry up!”

“You’ll be late!”

“Are you ready yet? The bell is about to ring!”

This is how it always goes, every morning. We always leave the house at the last minute. Every time I think to myself: if only she got out of bed earlier… if only she ate breakfast faster… if only she got dressed faster…

But it doesn’t matter. No matter what time she gets up, I always take her to school at around the same time. Often, she’s the last kid to enter the classroom, just in time — or a minute late. Today was no different.

I find it reassuring that we are not the only ones to fill time this way. There’s even a name for this phenomenon: Parkinson’s Law. It states that “work expands so as to fill the time available for its completion.” It appears that “work” can mean anything that requires effort, including getting ready for school.

I often wonder it there’s a cure for this ‘last-minuteness’ of ours. Or if we simply have to accept our genes the way they are. After all, why should we want to cure ourselves from who we are?