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I'm one of those perpetually late people. There was a time when I was slightly overweight. I changed my diet, started lifting weights and running, and ended up

I'm one of those perpetually late people. There was a time when I was slightly overweight. I changed my diet, started lifting weights and running, and ended up running a marathon 18 months later. But I couldn't fix my lateness. Pretty sure I had to run to the marathon starting area to be able to start with my group. I've found that exercising control over my body is easy. The body is stupid. It does what I tell it to do. It complains, but it will only fight back when it absolutely cannot physically perform the task. Not so much with my brain. The brain is smart. It fights back. I can look directly at a (digital) clock, and my brain can refuse to process the time on it. I can dig around and produce piles of evidence of all the different ways I tried to fix this, all the different treatments I sought, how much sincere effort I put in, and a complete lack of results. Don't take executive function for granted. Also, our lateness usually hurts us far more than others around us. Nothing is "too important" to be late for. And the things that usually make us late aren't generally important. Most of the time, they're complete wastes of time that didn't need to be done at all in the first place.

manmal 9y ago
I‘m exactly like this. The only way that helps is to get ready 30-60m ahead of the time I had originally planned to, and then wait it out. But since I hate to wait on other people, I don’t do this as often.
- maccard 9y ago
  So you’re saying that your 30 minutes is more valuable than mine? And that your hatred of waiting on other people is more important than whatever you were supposed to do? I don’t care if you’re 30 minutes late once or twice and you tell me, but if you tell me “oh sorry I’m late, I saw that I could have left on time but I’d rather have you wait on me than be on time” then that’s an instant way to piss anyone off.
  - BrandoElFollito 9y ago
    Exactly. I believe that if people were forced to say this phrase nobody would be late anymore. (sorry for the short comment but I came to say the same)
  - manmal 9y ago
    I didn’t mean to say that it’s good that I‘m behaving this way. And I‘m not responsible for every emotion I have, you know. Some things need working on before you can get in control of them. EDIT: Removed comment about downvotes.
    - grzm 9y ago
      The guidelines ask that we don't comment on downvotes: > "Please don't comment about the voting on comments. It never does any good, and it makes boring reading." https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
      - manmal 9y ago
        I apologize and retract my comment - cannot delete it now. Do you have a bot that looks for downvote keywords?
        grzm 9y ago
        Nope. Just read a lot of comments.
        manmal 9y ago
        I see. I‘m asking because the response came almost instantly.
        grzm 9y ago
        Like I said, I read a lot of comments :)
croon 9y ago
Are you late the same amount of time every time? I was like this, and so is most of my old friends still to this day. I still snooze and never come in to work at a regular time, but I've never missed a morning meeting when one is planned. I just scope out my getting ready, the drive in, account for extra traffic and finding parking, and then add an extra 5-10 minutes on top of the worst case time. I can't remember the last time I was late to anything now, so it's rare enough that it has to be because of a car breakdown or anything else extraordinary. Everything that involves more people than you are "too important" to be late for if there is a fixed time set.
- JimboOmega 9y ago
  I'm atrocious at time scoping. I view the time to get to a place to be the time on a vehicle in the best case, for instance. I ignore elevators, parking, traffic/transit delays, all of it. In particular the almost inevitable time spent searching for all my things to get out the door. Getting ready in the morning is a particular challenge because it varies tremendously. Some days I might fuss around with my outfit and makeup for an hour, other days I can get out the door in 15 minutes. It's not just the time I "feel like" spending, it's time looking for things, time getting distracted... and time just badly planned (I think I am so early, when I'm not, because I plan these things badly).

manmal 9y ago

I‘m exactly like this. The only way that helps is to get ready 30-60m ahead of the time I had originally planned to, and then wait it out. But since I hate to wait on other people, I don’t do this as often.

maccard 9y ago
So you’re saying that your 30 minutes is more valuable than mine? And that your hatred of waiting on other people is more important than whatever you were supposed to do? I don’t care if you’re 30 minutes late once or twice and you tell me, but if you tell me “oh sorry I’m late, I saw that I could have left on time but I’d rather have you wait on me than be on time” then that’s an instant way to piss anyone off.
- BrandoElFollito 9y ago
  Exactly. I believe that if people were forced to say this phrase nobody would be late anymore. (sorry for the short comment but I came to say the same)
- manmal 9y ago
  I didn’t mean to say that it’s good that I‘m behaving this way. And I‘m not responsible for every emotion I have, you know. Some things need working on before you can get in control of them. EDIT: Removed comment about downvotes.
  - grzm 9y ago
    The guidelines ask that we don't comment on downvotes: > "Please don't comment about the voting on comments. It never does any good, and it makes boring reading." https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
    - manmal 9y ago
      I apologize and retract my comment - cannot delete it now. Do you have a bot that looks for downvote keywords?
      - grzm 9y ago
        Nope. Just read a lot of comments.
        manmal 9y ago
        I see. I‘m asking because the response came almost instantly.
        grzm 9y ago
        Like I said, I read a lot of comments :)

croon 9y ago

Are you late the same amount of time every time? I was like this, and so is most of my old friends still to this day. I still snooze and never come in to work at a regular time, but I've never missed a morning meeting when one is planned. I just scope out my getting ready, the drive in, account for extra traffic and finding parking, and then add an extra 5-10 minutes on top of the worst case time. I can't remember the last time I was late to anything now, so it's rare enough that it has to be because of a car breakdown or anything else extraordinary. Everything that involves more people than you are "too important" to be late for if there is a fixed time set.

JimboOmega 9y ago
I'm atrocious at time scoping. I view the time to get to a place to be the time on a vehicle in the best case, for instance. I ignore elevators, parking, traffic/transit delays, all of it. In particular the almost inevitable time spent searching for all my things to get out the door. Getting ready in the morning is a particular challenge because it varies tremendously. Some days I might fuss around with my outfit and makeup for an hour, other days I can get out the door in 15 minutes. It's not just the time I "feel like" spending, it's time looking for things, time getting distracted... and time just badly planned (I think I am so early, when I'm not, because I plan these things badly).