Magic 401: Procrastination
Procrastination is its own hell. Lwa are generally willing to let you slog through that hell, both because it is important for you to recognize that procrastination creates problems and because it teaches people that obedience is inherently rewarding. Prompt obedience clears whatever you don’t want to do off your plate so that you can get on with something else. The lwa are incredibly patient, if not particularly interested in humoring the mental gymnastics people do to justify procrastination.
We do be sounding real dumb when we try to assert that procrastination is anything but our unwillingness to do something.
Two things are simultaneously true: you have eternity to get it right and a habit of procrastination will help you hurt yourself. In magic, as with the lessons the lwa and divine give us, timing is important. Magical works have to be done on specific days, parties are held on specific days, and lessons are easier to learn under some conditions than others. Generally, when the lesson is freshly presented, it is easier to learn than it is if you procrastinate it for decades. Not impossible, merely harder to learn.
One of the reasons the lessons get harder to learn is because, as is true of many things in vodou, where we have learned that we can’t be trusted to do things we’re asked to do, we have added additional content to whatever lesson we’re currently working on. We have added, for instance, lessons on the topic of learning how to be trustworthy. Wherever we have learned a negative lesson about ourselves, it will need to be the focus of learning at some point. From the perspective of the divinity, this was the outcome that was always going to occur.
From your view, you just added more to the seemingly unpleasant things you’re going to be tasked with. There is no rule or reason you’re only going to work on one thing at a time. What you’re working on will be as much as you can handle.
Timing has always been an issue of respect in vodou—works that are supposed to be done on a specific day and are done on another can be interpreted by your lwa as disrespectful. And certainly, making an appointment with a priest, spiritual worker, or another vodouizan that you do not show up to can also be interpreted as disrespect. You will always be expected to manage your behavior as a part of respect and honor. That respect and honor extends to your society and other vodouizan, not just your lwa.
Learning not to procrastinate has a ton of benefits, from greater success with magic to accelerated growth, elevation, and healing. It also tends to clear your energy and time in a multitude of ways. Whatever you intend to procrastinate, it cannot be avoided.
The only thing you can do is make problems for yourself in the mean time, but a teacher can help you.
