Overcoming procrastination

Procrastinating: a tendency to systematically push away for later something you should be doing now.

Everybody is procrastinating on some level, because there are things we don’t like neither want to do. Like cleaning, doing laundry, doing taxes, taking care of administration files pending for months, starting a cooking Youtube channel …

Avoidance strategy works, only for a while, and to a certain limit.

Most of the time, when we procrastinate it’s because we are running away from a tedious task, but mostly an uncomfortable feeling, the fear of failure, of rejection, of financial stress etc…

Many things can push you to procrastinate:

• You are bored by the task.
• You would need to do something new, but what you have to do is too repetitive.
• Your overall calendar and time management needs to be re organized.
• You need to break down your task into several small ones more achievable.
• You are scared of failing … or succeeding (yes, that’s a big one).
• You are too much of a perfectionist and end up actually never doing the thing.

I don’t think it’s possible to work on procrastination if we don’t know that we are doing it … or if we don’t want to admit it.

But procrastinating looks like this: always having excuses, giving priorities to things that are not important, spending too much time just doing research and more research …

If you REALLY have to do something, like your taxes, procrastinating too much will get you in even more trouble (hello hundreds or thousands of late fees).

And if you are pushing back on starting a new work project or a creative project, you are holding yourself back from learning, growing, getting opportunities to do something you like and makes an impact in the world.

I myself, procrastinate a lot on personal and creative projects because I am afraid of failing. I feel like everybody has already done and said everything. Why should I speak and bring my contribution when the world is already overflowed with information?

Do you know what pushed me to express myself online? When I saw people who don’t seem to be bothered to be posting low quality or offensive content … and they grew audiences with it ! So I told myself fuck it, let’s do this thing, let’s write the blog and start the social media accounts !

A few ways to fight procrastination that work:

Break down your task. If you are trying to do something complex in a very short amount of time, you increase your chances of failure. And when you fail, you re enforce your thought of “I am a failure, I suck, I shouldn’t have done it”. Make life a bit easier for you and simplify your task, break it into different steps and spread them around your schedule.

Time management is key. Don’t try to do something by getting into it for 4 hours straight. If you are already stressed or afraid by the task, you are going to have more difficulties keeping your focus on it and be distracted. Work for half an hour, take a 15 minutes break, repeat 3 to 4 times and then, move on to something easy for you to do.

Minimize or suppress for a while your distractions. AKA turn off your phone notifications, no TV, no music, no working in a noisy environment. Give yourself the best chances to be effective for the time slot that you have for your task.

Tone down the fear. Write down 1 or 2 or the worse things that could happen to you. I was scared to create an Instagram or TikTok account. What could happen? No followers, no views, no comments … and what? I am not doing to die because of it, and eventually I will learn how to make it work. If you are facing a fear towards something more professional, get advice from a mentor, moral support from a colleague, prepare yourself the best way possible so IN CASE of an issue, you will know you did your best!

Visualize yourself making it work. This is a strategy that I particularly struggle with. I grew up with an anxious mom, anxious grand parents so I became anxious myself. Every time I start something or just think about it, I see myself failing horribly. Which is nuts, because I did fail in my life many times, but also accomplished very cool things. It takes practice with your mind not to always see the catastrophe scenario. But it’s a practice and like everything in life, you can get better at it. Close your eyes, see yourself doing what you want, imagine the sensations in your body, how you would feel, how it would change your relationships around you. You can see yourself failing, give yourself credit and visualize yourself being good and succeeding.

Plan to have a little something to make you happy right after as a reward. The perspective of having some kind of reward after a task I am procrastinating is helping me a lot. It can be as simple as cuddling my dog for a while, listen to a song, go for a swim or have a piece of chocolate. Motivate yourself with the things you know you can have to feel good for a moment!

Now that I have been talking about doing things for a while ….

Stop reading, take a big deep breath, count to three and do what you have to do.

It’s going to be uncomfortable, cringe and scary for a while, and then it will become better. With a good strategy, organization and time for yourself to recover when needed, there is no reason you can’t make it !

~ Don’t hesitate to share in the comments section what has been your biggest procrastination lately and what you would need to go past it ~