Procrastination
Get Out of Your Way: Our thoughts get in the way of completing our goals & priorities.
When we feel too busy or too lazy, we are giving ourselves the excuse to not complete something. We either don’t know how to complete a task or we don’t want to complete it. Some people will use the words, “I can’t do it.” If that sentence pops into your head, then you need to find someone who can ‘do it’ and ask for help.
Once we change the way we think about our goals & priorities, we will begin to change the way we address them.
Procrastination, the act: Procrastination is the act of delaying or postponing actions by choosing short-term comforts over long-term goals or priorities.
Procrastination can cause significant consequences to the health of our minds, body, spirit, relationships, finances & work.
These delays & postponements never lead us to lasting joy & happiness.
Recognizing procrastination as a true-activity that adds burden to our lives is the first step in making the needed changes to relieve ourselves from this self-inflicted behavior.
Breaking Procrastination: To break any procrastination habit, one must ‘do’. But how do we ‘do’ something, when we are feeling too busy or too lazy. Consider trying all or some of the following actions:
Break the task into small achievable steps
Set start & end time
Schedule the task or activity on your calendar
Incorporate the task into your daily routines
Remove distractions to bring attention to the subject
Read books & articles about the goals & priorities that you want to achieve/complete
Ask a buddy to help you with your accountability to complete the task
Join a community & surround yourself with people who share the same goals, values & priorities
Celebrate the task completion with a positive & healthy reward
Be kind to yourself
Boredom-Procrastination Cycle: Boredom & procrastination are closely connected, often fueling each other in a cycle of inaction.
Boredom occurs when tasks feel unstimulating or unchallenging
When we are bored, we tend to seek out distractions or more engaging activities, even if they aren't productive, which leads to procrastination.
Procrastinating because of boredom creates a sense of guilt or stress, further complicating the task at hand.
The more we procrastinate, the more mundane and overwhelming tasks appear, reinforcing the initial feeling of boredom.
We need to recognize boredom as a signal to break this cycle. Use this signal to make the task more engaging by setting a mini-goal, introducing a game-like approach or reframing it as a learning opportunity.
Procrastination-Breaking Resources: