Let's not lie: each of us is familiar with procrastination firsthand. Most are even able to courageously admit that from time to time we intentionally (or not?) delay making an important decision that can affect our lives. It could be a trip to the dentist, a large or small task waiting to be completed, or something as simple as cleaning the house. Today we will try to find out in what situations one should be on guard and what can help in the guerrilla fight against this unfavorable quality for a person.
Without delay, let's get started.
Determine if you really need to do this
Perhaps the reason for your procrastination lies in the lack of a compelling reason to take action. A job that you can’t stand, or something else that you haven’t loved since childhood, that you always wanted to get rid of, is in a completely different category, which does not include dreams and real goals.
In such situations, I would advise you to first of all approach the assessment of the upcoming task critically: why waste time on something that you absolutely do not like, if there are many other tasks that are a pleasure to take on?
How to overcome the habit of putting everything off until tomorrow?
If a person has realized that the habit of postponing everything until later entails many problems that interfere with life, and he must get rid of it at all costs, then he will probably succeed. It is important to ask yourself the question that famous American entrepreneur Steve Jobs formulated: “Do you want to spend your life selling soda, or do you want to change the world?”
A procrastinator, aware of his habit of constantly being distracted by other things, should make a plan and write down everything he needs to do, as well as indicate the approximate time he plans to spend on completing each task. Clear time frames will allow you to become more disciplined and organized.
Even if the upcoming tasks seem tedious, difficult, uninteresting, etc., it’s worth taking the first step. As they say, “The one who walks can master the road.”
As a rule, we put off until later those things that cause us internal resistance. Here it is worth remembering the words: “If you cannot change the situation, try to change your attitude towards it.” That is, every unpleasant duty or necessity can be looked at from a different point of view: “I’m afraid to go to the dentist. But the sooner I start treating my teeth, the easier the treatment will be.” Or: “The sooner we start repairs, the sooner we will finish it and can go on vacation.”
It also happens that we are entrusted with a task that we have no right to refuse, but which seems pointless to us. Due to lack of motivation, we just can’t take it on. However, in almost any activity you can find (or invent) personal meaning, which will serve as an incentive. Here, by the way, it would be useful to recall the old parable about the three men who carried stones. When they were asked what they were doing, one answered: “I plow like an ox,” the second said: “I make money,” and the third: “I’m building a temple here!”
After a successfully completed task, you should definitely reward yourself: take a bath, walk, run, or just get some sleep. After all, the body requires a mental and physical reboot.
Some people do the opposite: failing to meet deadlines, they deny themselves something: movies, meetings, entertainment. Others have come up with the following way of punishing themselves for disorganization: they give a certain amount of money to one of their friends for safekeeping with the condition that if they do not complete the planned work on time, the friend will keep the money for himself.
It is said that the French writer Victor Hugo did this: he ordered his servant not to give him clothes until he had written a certain number of lines.
Thus, to train yourself to do work on time, you need to:
- distribute all tasks according to importance;
- break a complex task that requires more time than others into several small ones;
- find motivation in every task;
- remove all distractions away from your eyes;
- do not take on a new business until the old one is finished.
Conduct a little “reconnaissance in force”
Once you've figured out which tasks are idle, take one of them and complete a small portion of it to get a feel for the difficulty level. Based on the impressions received during the process, decide whether you need help.
Often we overload ourselves with thoughts about how many things need to be done, and then we cannot move, imagining an endless list of tasks: there are many of them, but the worker, that is, you, is alone. This approach is obviously wrong. What if you spend, say, 15 minutes or half an hour on a pressing issue? It is likely that you will get a taste for it, thereby moving the needle.
Use the Pomodoro Method
This time management technique is named after the kitchen tomato timer. Its creator, Francesco Cirillo, suggested breaking tasks into 25-minute periods (called “pomodoros”) and taking 5-minute breaks between them:
- Choose something to do right now and set a timer.
- As soon as one “pomodoro” comes to an end, put a mark on a piece of paper.
- After every 4th pomodoro, take a break of 15-30 minutes.
Many experts are confident that this approach will help cope with both a large list of tasks and one project.
Listen to yourself. And do the opposite
Best friend “I’ll do it tomorrow” - “I don’t want something.” If rebellious sentiments grow in the soul, we must fight them as decisively and harshly as international terrorism. After all, if you follow your desire to do nothing, what will happen next? That's right, nothing.
So, before you take on something that cannot be avoided, try to get into a new mood: meditate, take a walk, or resort to another method that works for you.
Eliminate sunk costs
Just because you put a lot of effort, time and emotion into a project doesn't mean it's worth it. In economics, this state of affairs is called “sunk costs.” For example, you decided to study programming in your free time, but after a few months, despite all your efforts, you have not made much progress, and your enthusiasm has faded.
Perhaps programming is simply not your thing and you will achieve much greater heights faster by switching to another field - for example, design.
Order first
The environment around you can successfully both contribute to procrastination and help in the fight against it. Take a quick look around your desk, your home decor, or any other place where you will be working.
Surely not everything around you is in a state of perfect order, so find the strength to tidy up: get rid of the trash, put everything in its place so that the eye is happy and the work goes smoothly.
By the way, after a little cleaning it seems easier. See for yourself.
Who is a procrastinator
Procrastinators are usually people with low self-esteem. Most often they were raised by overbearing parents. If adults force children to do everything strictly according to the schedule and control their every step, then by the beginning of adulthood the child does not develop the skill of independently planning his affairs and fulfilling his plans without a clear external incentive (for example, strictly set deadlines or promises). In this case, a person constantly postpones his affairs to tomorrow, to the day after tomorrow. He tells himself that he will do this job when he has more sleep, when he has more time, etc. Soon, the lack of results begins to interfere with the work, and the person begins to feel unsure of his abilities and his professionalism.
Procrastinators don’t just procrastinate for time; they replace the task at hand with other things. For example, they watch news on the Internet or videos on YouTube. Another important feature of procrastinators is low resistance to disease. In psychology, there is a term “going into illness,” when, due to the reluctance to do an important task, a person develops real symptoms of the disease: blood pressure rises, headache, stomach ache.
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Accustom yourself to the thought: now it will always be like this
As a rule, the first steps in anything, be it sports or new responsibilities at work, are always difficult. Probably the simplest example would be a situation in which each of us found ourselves at least once in our lives. Remember the magic Snooze button on your alarm clock? I bet you may not know what this English word means, but you definitely know how this button works: there is nothing easier than pressing it and continuing to sleep peacefully.
So, you should not succumb to this kind of temptation, listening to your inner voice calling you to put everything on the back burner. Forget about the rules of etiquette when he once again sounds in your head: cut off his tirade mid-sentence and do what you have to do.
Take turns doing things
You only need to do one task at a time. Move on to the next task only when you complete the previous one. This way you will complete all your tasks, and your closed lists will be reduced.
How it works
Today you plan to withdraw an application for a vacancy, place an ad on Headhunter and create an offer to the candidate. Do everything progressively:
- meet with the hiring manager, ask him clarifying questions about the vacancy and understand what kind of candidate you need to find;
- when you complete the first task, proceed to post the vacancy on Headhunter;
- only when the vacancy has already been posted, proceed to creating an offer. In Huntflow, you can create it with just one click - this way you will have more time for the next tasks.
Tell a trusted person about your important decision.
It could be your business partner, wife or best friend - or anyone, as long as he is aware. Express your intentions to this person, identifying key points, dates and deadlines. Ask him to monitor you as an experiment.
It may very well be that your ally in the struggle for productivity himself needs help and additional motivation in life. Therefore, we urge you to be honest with each other: gently but firmly point out places that, in your opinion, require special attention. And take action.
Wake up early
Do you want to do everything? You'll have to reconsider your regime. Yes, sitting until the morning with a cup of coffee and frantically typing articles is a very exciting process, but to prevent this from happening regularly, wake up early. This will give you extra time that you can spend on finishing things you have already started and planning further actions. This is especially true for people who are too busy during the daytime.
Listen to Indian mantras
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Even if you are not a regular at ethnic festivals and have never thought about traveling to Nepal or Goa, pay attention to the national music of the country of elephants and curry sauce. Mantras are positive attitudes, by listening to them and meditating, you can find peace and tune in to the right mood. The first thing to learn is to control your breathing. When you are able to do this, you can begin to comprehend more complex states - concentration on what you need.
By the way, there are many mantras. You can experiment and choose what you like and what works.
Handle things correctly
Set aside time each day to finish unfinished work. Put everything you don't have time to do into separate folders - physical or virtual - and put them away. To sort them out, set aside a special time at the beginning or end of the day.
Once you've run out of things in your folders, find the thing you want to tackle and tackle it first each day.
How it works
Today you received an application from a hiring manager and learned that another client wants to look at five more resumes this week. Don’t rush to immediately withdraw your application and select suitable resumes. Put all these tasks in a separate folder so that you can calmly complete all current tasks. You can return to these tasks the next day.
Create some problems for yourself
Or a lot, depending on who needs it. What am I talking about? The fact is that suffering and various types of grief are also sources of motivation: a feeling of unsettlement pushes us forward, and we change jobs, move, learn something new.
Having reached a certain point of awareness of a situation that he does not like, a normal person begins to act. So, if you are still sitting still and prefer not to think about the problem, then everything suits you, nothing else.
In general, you are the very wizard who can help you cope with everything. As the wise Mahatma Gandhi taught us, if you want a change in the future, become that change in the present.
He who dares wins
Curb your fear! Fear of something is the surest accomplice of procrastination. Just tell yourself: “No, I’m not afraid of anything, I will succeed.” Repeat this more often, write it down on a piece of paper and hang it in a visible place - we have already talked about the benefits of visualizing thoughts in point number 12. If you manage to gain control over fear at least once, you will succeed in the future.
How to do it? Talk to yourself - everyone has done this at least once in their life. So why not make it a good, healthy habit? Alone with your thoughts, you can not bend your heart and not look for excuses for your negative traits: fear, laziness, reluctance to change something. Try to identify your problem areas and start dealing with them.
Refer friends
No, we do not encourage asking your loved ones to do all the work for you. Just promise your friends or colleagues that you will complete the task on time. Find a group of people who practice healthy eating, or create your own chat on Whatsapp or Telegram, where you and other people losing weight will post daily reports about what you eat and workouts.
Researchers believe that people who make commitments to others and communicate their results periodically are twice as likely to achieve their goals. Don't feel ashamed to ask your loved ones to motivate you when you're off track or feeling drained.
Work on self-discipline
To be honest, the choice is often not that great: either muster all your willpower today and take the path of change, or reap the bitter fruits of disappointment in the foreseeable future. Leaving the solution to important life issues for later is too easy and, alas, completely ineffective.
Many people know the proverb “If you sow a thought, you will reap an action; if you sow an action, you will reap a habit; if you sow a habit, you will reap a character; if you sow a character, you will reap a destiny.” Charge yourself with the right thoughts, acquire good habits, because everything is in your hands.
In general, each of us is nothing more than a collection of habits and ways of life. You can train yourself to do absolutely anything. Take advantage of this feature of human consciousness!
Declare war on perfectionism
In fact, there is absolutely nothing good about it. First, let's look at the definition. Perfectionism is the belief that the best results can (or should) be achieved. It would seem that there is nothing bad, but by thinking in this way, we are infinitely moving away from the true goal, which is to get the job done - get sh*t done, as they say overseas.
The main mistake that many people tend to make is substituting concepts. Perfectionism has nothing to do with high quality. No matter what anyone tells us about this, the answer will be the same: time is money. Learn to control it the same way an experienced commander controls his army.
Don't forget to encourage yourself
It happens that we lack the reward for a task completed successfully. We must not forget about encouragement, because it is one of the most powerful sources of internal motivation. That's why it's so important to celebrate your victories, both big and small. Have an extraordinary day off, treat yourself to a purchase you have long dreamed of, and be imbued with the joy of triumph!
After all, fighting procrastination is not easy. As Jim Rohn, a famous American speaker and business coach, said in his book “Vitamins for the Mind”:
We all must experience two kinds of pain: the pain of discipline and the pain of regret. The difference is that discipline weighs ounces, while regret weighs tons.
Are you prone to procrastination? What and for what reason do you tend to put off over and over again? Share with us your opinion and successful experience in dealing with the scourge!
Types of procrastination
The following types of procrastination are distinguished:
- Household - regular household chores, such as wet cleaning or taking out the trash, are postponed.
- Procrastination of decision making - any decisions are postponed, although the necessary information is already available.
- Neurotic - tasks of vital necessity are postponed.
- Academic - all issues related to learning are delayed.
- Compulsive - manifests itself as an established type of behavior.
Scientists Chu and Choi distinguish two types of procrastinators: passive and active. Passive people delay doing things, although they do not want to do it. Active people deliberately put things off; they work more effectively within a very limited time frame.
Researcher J.R. Ferrari, in turn, divides passive procrastinators, who are the majority, into indecisive and avoidant. Those who are indecisive are afraid of making mistakes and therefore procrastinate. Avoidants experience fear of criticism from other people.
