In all honesty, I can’t think of a time when I wasn’t a chronically late person. At 12 years old, I would leave for school a few minutes too late, forcing my dad to step on the pedal to get me there on time. One ill-fated morning when I was running late, I skipped looking left and right before opening the car door and slammed it into an unassuming cyclist. Thankfully, he was unscathed, but visualising his crash to the floor makes me flinch with guilt to this day.

This chaos didn’t deter me from running behind. My childhood friends got into the habit of waiting in my bedroom – chatting with my mum or scrolling on their phones – while I rushed to get ready. The new friends I made as an adult were less forgiving, though. It turns out that “I’m just a late person” doesn’t really cut it as an excuse. I’ve been labelled disrespectful and messy more times than I’d like –sometimes it’s banter; at other times, not so much.

In moments when I’ve felt cornered, I’ve pulled out the “I accept you for your flaws, so why can’t you let this go?” card. As you might expect, that didn’t end well: continued tardiness can test people’s patience and I don’t blame them. Despite knowing this is an issue, and being 26 years of age, I still arrive at least 15 minutes late everywhere I go, frantically typing out “I’m so sorry” messages while blow-drying my hair or speed-walking to the bus stop. And don’t even get me started on the money I could have saved if I didn’t succumb to all those SOS Uber journeys.

In addition to how it impacts people around me, being late is excruciating for my anxiety. I’ll skip meals (because there just isn’t enough time to eat) and arrive at my plans tired, frazzled and disappointed in myself. Something needs to change, and my inability to adult on my own has led me into the hands of experts.

Clare Evans, a time management and productivity coach based in London, explains that chronically tardy people like me should adopt a simple formula: the further you have to travel, the earlier you have to leave. “For many, being late is about underestimating how much time you need. Google Maps may tell you it takes 25 minutes to get to your destination, but this doesn’t account for the five minutes it takes to find your house keys, lock up, use the toilet etc.”

If you’re a late person, I’m positive someone has already told you to move your clocks forward or to try arriving 15 minutes early, so you reach where you’re going on time. Evans confirms this advice isn’t just a preachy myth but is truly helpful. She adds: “Instead of leaving everything to the nth degree, plan ahead. If you struggle when deciding what to wear, think about your outfit the night before and leave it out. This makes the process of leaving feel less daunting.”

I can’t help but feel validated when hearing this. Often, the mental gymnastics of finding the perfect dress for an occasion keeps me from getting off the bed and starting the process of getting ready. I’d rather stay safe and comfortable with my emotional support pillow than try on five pieces of clothing that probably don’t fit me quite so well anymore. Dr Sona Kaur, psychologist at Serenity Psychology Services, urges me to dig deeper into this reasoning that inadvertently frames my lateness. “Many people procrastinate or delay starting something as an avoidance tactic,” she says. “Ask yourself: what are you trying to put off? Is there any personal or social anxiety associated with this plan? Are you hoping the other person cancels?”

I find myself sheepishly nodding. Beyond the stress of finding what to wear, the friend meet-ups that are hardest for me to reach in time are the ones on weekdays after work. As a journalist, so much of my job is speaking to other people – either in interviews or over emails – that I often exhaust my social battery during office hours. I still yearn to hang out with my friends over glasses of wine but I need more time between the end of my working day and the start of a plan. 

Dr Kaur suggests that my lateness could have something to do with taking on more than I can handle. “If you know you have a busy day of meetings, don’t be overly optimistic and cram in a social plan. Some of us need buffer time between tasks and mapping out a day from hour to hour isn’t feasible – there’s only so much you can realistically do,” she explains. It’s scarily accurate: every Sunday I jot down numerous plans in my calendar, justifying the blocked days by calling it the much-romanticised work-life balance.

The result? By the middle of the week, I’m exhausted and burnt out. I can see myself reaching each place later, blaming a delayed Tube, a bus that stopped too long between driver changes, my maps app acting up – the list is endless. The other person feels slighted because I’ve wasted their time; I’m not relaxing either, because I’m mentally prepping to get from one task to the other. To save everyone the discomfort, my people-pleasing self should learn how to say ‘no’ or suggest an alternative day when I might feasibly get somewhere on time. No matter how much I want to be that nonchalant, positively extroverted person, I can’t scurry along from one plan to another. 

Time blindness is another thing I learned during this process. Dr Kaur describes this feeling as an inability to register how long a task takes. “Try to measure the time it takes for a shower or for you to make and have a meal so you can put numbers to these ideas,” she tells me. It’s only been three days since I tracked my tasks (22 minutes for my shower routine, 29 minutes for meals) and at the risk of sounding overly optimistic, I think this is already helping me to be more organised.

Am I finally on the path to being better with time? Well, let’s hope so. I don’t expect this to be a linear journey, but I can’t lie, I’m very excited about all the things I can buy with the money I’ll save by not taking Ubers. 

Images: Getty