Tackle Procrastination Head-On

Don’t beat yourself up if you find yourself procrastinating a bit more these days. When faced with too many assignments or too many things to accomplish, procrastination is an all too common inclination for many people. Tasks that might normally seem mundane appear more difficult when there’s too much on your plate.
By the way, there’s too much on your plate!

Be honest with yourself and admit your procrastination. Say it in the mirror if that makes it more real for you! “Hello, my name is _____, and I am a procrastinator.” If you make excuses or rationalize why you’re not getting started, you open up the door to even more delay. If you’re honest with yourself and acknowledge when you are procrastinating, then you’re closer to taking action. Even the teeniest action in pursuit of a long-term goal is far better than nothing.

When push comes to shove – and here comes a shove – sometimes your best approach to procrastination is to simply face it head-on by searching for what exactly is blocking you. What is the real reason you can’t seem to get started? Many moons ago, in her book Creative Procrastination: Organizing Your Own Life, author Frieda Porat offered a host of reasons why individuals procrastinate:

Fear of disapproval, failure, making mistakes, being wrong.
Sticking your neck out, being noticed, not being noticed.
Confronting the unknown, committing ourselves, exposing our inadequacies.
Taking on too much difficult task, getting into trouble, being less than perfect.
Being rejected, being on the wrong side, and getting criticized.

Could it be that one or more of these issues ring true for you? If so, your quest is to find the root cause of that fear. Did something happen on an earlier job, or even earlier in life, that is prohibiting you from getting back on the horse? Do you fear that you won’t do a good enough job or that you’ll fail if you try?

Keep in mind that if the task is vital, it’s worth starting, even of you do fail. Allow yourself to have a less than gracious start. Proceed in the face of choppy progress. Expect nausea. Barf if you have to. The boat will still sail.

When facing a notable task, self-starters recognize that true and lasting accomplishments require high costs in terms of hours, energy and commitment.

Give yourself periodic acknowledgement as you progress toward your final desired objective. Progress is not always even. Heck, is it ever even? Anticipate some level of breakdown and backsliding. Two steps forward and one step back is more often the rule than the exception.

Be gentle with yourself and cut yourself some slack, Jack. After all, if you made no attempt, your chance of succeeding would be zero, a perfect goose egg.

Perhaps you can’t get started on something because you haven’t identified some lingering issues that are impacting your feelings. Such issues might include.
Having mixed feelings about the task.

Thinking a task is unnecessary or unworthy of you.
Resenting having to follow through on a promise because you weren’t able to say “no” in the first place.

If you can identify some of the underlying reasons behind procrastination, you have a more decent chance of surmounting them than if you didn’t articulate the issues to yourself. Fess up and win! When you can identify the root cause of your procrastination, ask yourself about the consequences of not getting started. If the consequences you will experience as a result of not initiating the task are minor, you probably will not get started. If you recognize that the consequences are significant, then get a move on!

Occasionally you procrastinate because the issue at hand does not need to be handled, and the consequences of not taking action are minimal. Hold on there, bro, I’m not introducing this observation as an easy way for you to rationalize delaying tasks and responsibilities.

I’m simply saying there are occasions when your hesitation is based upon sound reasoning, such as when the task you have been putting off:

1.Doesn’t need to be done.
2.Doesn’t need to be done by you.
3.Doesn’t need to be done in this way.
4.Doesn’t need to be done now.

It’s worth making the determination.


Regards,


Timben