How to beat procrastination?
I have seen people who feel pride in procrastinating. I don’t find that attitude cute or charming. It is a bad trait, and it will get in the way if it isn’t dealt with.
However, passing judgment is slightly more complex than that. Yes, every time we procrastinate, that was our active decision. We chose to do that. However, in the long term, taken as a pattern of behavior, a person doesn’t develop procrastination habits deliberately; it comes on its own, before we truly understand it. It develops due to our lazy behavior and rationalizations meant to keep us in our comfort zone. Many of these rationalizations aren’t innate, they were planted in us by others, but we allowed them to grow.
To be clear on definitions, procrastination is the act of postponing or delaying something because it seems boring, you fear doing it, or you don’t want to expend the effort.
Initially, someone may sound cool if he/she procrastinates, since it’s a widely accepted and universal problem, but there comes a stage in life when we realize that we should give up this habit, or at least not let it hold us back.
Let’s discuss a few tips to beat it.
Before I proceed further, I would like to tell you we all have procrastinated at least once in our lives. Everyone has something they wanted to do, or knew they should, but didn’t do it. Don’t take pride in procrastinating, but don’t feel shame either. Both emotions are focusing too much on the act of idleness itself, which is not helpful.
Before I continue, there are two types of procrastination with different effects:
1: Procrastinating on a deadline. For instance, in school I would hold off on studying until the last minute. This led to lower quality work and mediocre grades, as well as more and more stress as the deadline approached.
2: Procrastinating without a deadline. This is the more insidious type. This is when you hold back on the things that only you yourself hold accountable. Getting in shape, getting a better job, things that don’t really have a harsh consequence upon not completing the goal by a set time. Procrastination is a lot more deeply-rooted for most people dealing with long-term life goals.
Now then, let’s start with nine tips to beat procrastination.
1) Stay focused. The more you envision your activity and mentally involve yourself in its intricacies, the less chance other things have of consuming your attention.
2) Set short term and long term goals. Reward yourself for meeting them.
3) Try to keep yourself energetic, don’t lose your interest in any task. Expose yourself to new things to keep yourself from falling into a rut. Remember, boredom leads to procrastination. I know how weird that sounds, that being bored increases your chance of doing nothing productive, but it’s true.
4) Read motivational books, articles, blogs, etc. I would be privileged to have you as one of my frequent readers. Being a lifestyle blogger, I write a lot of inspirational articles.
5) Have commitments and set up a schedule for your daily chores. This helps you get some momentum for getting things done, which you can pass forward to important tasks.
6) Avoid the company of lazy and negative people. They say that if you hang out with nine high-achieving millionaires every day, you’ll eventually become the tenth, and the opposite is also true.
7) Identify your fears, but don’t overthink them. For many, journaling helps shrink and compartmentalize these issues, providing more perspective on them. Another trick I know is to simply write out all your fears, then all your goals to defeat them, and just put the paper away somewhere. The mere act of writing them down once is proven to have a positive impact.
8) Don’t forget to entertain yourself and to not be too serious. Stay relaxed, do a light workout, go for a long walk, spend time with yourself, friends, family, etc. The essence is to stay positive and excited. Do not overwork yourself out of frustration or impatience. Most people with ambition fall into a cycle of overworking and procrastination. They go from no fun at all to no work at all, back and forth. Find a balance you can maintain through the week.
9) Try to minimize distractions in your life, especially social media. In fact, if you want to achieve great things in your life, give up social media entirely as a traditional user. You can be a content creator, a provider of things that people check on social media if it’s relevant to your aspirations. Otherwise, you should no longer be a regular consumer of social content.
By following the above tips, anyone can beat procrastination.
In the context of our discussion, I have an interesting article to share: “How to Never Wimp Out Again.“ I wrote this article a few days back and shared it with a friend of mine, who is indeed talented, but hesitates when he should be trying new things. The article is receiving an overwhelming response as people are finding it motivational and effective at shifting their inactive mindset. You can also explore the Knowledge Base section on my website to read answers to questions relating to lifestyle, motivation, and changing your thinking.
To sum up, it’s not really difficult to beat fear and stop procrastinating, provided you have a positive mindset, self-discipline, and an urge to excel. The biggest challenge is believing you really can, and that you deserve the rewards that come from pursuing what you want in life.
Please feel free to leave me a reply if you have any questions.
Be Positive! Stay Strong!
Good Luck!
Thanks,
Cleo