Failing at Failing

To fail, you have to at least try
to attempt something, anything.
It's not a failure if you don't lift
a finger to complete a given task.
I never failed at becoming a pianist
because I never started taking lessons.
It's only once action is applied that 
success and failure become possible.
Without it, things are just the same.

But what then of my constantly
incomplete To Do lists that grow into 
records of all the things I haven't done?
They certainly feel like failures when
I beat myself up daily for not doing
the things I need to get done.

The amount of time I spend torturing
myself for inaction is immeasurable.
Time and day again, I don't make a move,
infinitely plummeting myself into misery.
So much effort goes into worrying about it
that it feels like I've been trying for years,
failing every minute of every day.

Hours, days, weeks, months, years
of my life I spend mourning the
failures of tasks not yet started.
If anxiety counted for action, 
I'd be complete with my entire life already, 
yet I can't even finish a single To Do list.

There is something fundamentally wrong with me.
A disconnect between urgency and movement.
Ridiculing myself for not trying is as far as it gets
to moving forward with the important goals I have.
There I stay, dug in the ground,
stuck in the quicksand of self-pity.

How does one bridge thought into action?
What trick must I conjure to start trying?
I'm paralyzed before I have a chance to move.
Knowing I have to act doesn't 
change the outcome of avoidance.

I fail at failing while never succeeding.
I'd have to babysit myself every moment
to get anything done, but a child can't
watch himself for too long before he 
wonders off, distracted and alone.