“Procrastination is the bad habit of putting of until the day after tomorrow what should have been done the day before yesterday.”
- Napoleon Hill
There are many ways to avoid success in life, but the most sure-fire just might be procrastination. Seems that everyone’s famous last words are, “I’ll do it tomorrow.” What’s the harm, right? Well, the longer you put things off and push them further down your schedule, the more you increase your chances of doing the job messily, or worse yet, not getting it done at all.
Procrastination applies to every aspect of your life. Missed opportunities, frenzied work hours, stress, overwhelm, resentment, and guilt are just some of the symptoms. If you have a tendency to push things off to the last possible minute, chances are you do this in your professional and social life as well. And once this becomes a habit, it’s pretty hard to break.
Not to worry - you can stop procrastination with these two easy tips so start now!
Tip #1: Embrace your imperfection.
An erroneous thinking that leads to procrastination is perfectionism. Sometime, somewhere, in some twisted development of the modern human mindset, we saw imperfection as a bad thing. But, let me tell you something: Without incessant failures, we wouldn’t discover Einstein’s formula, Edison’s light bulb, Walton’s supercenter, the Wright Brothers’ aircraft, or Ford’s democratized vehicle.
Perfectionism is like a double-edged sword - it cuts both ways. Perfectionists often don’t realize that they are hurting themselves by their own actions. Thinking that you must do the job perfectly the first try will likely prevent you from ever getting started. Believing that you must do something perfectly is a recipe for stress, and you’ll associate that stress with the task and thus condition yourself to avoid it. You then end up putting the task off to the last possible minute, so that you finally have a way out of this trap.
So give yourself permission to be human. When you embrace your imperfection, you drive yourself to do something — anything. Realize that an imperfect job completed today is always superior to the perfect job delayed indefinitely.
Tip #2: You are in control, so replace “have to” with “want to.”
When you tell yourself that you have to do something, you’ll automatically feel a sense of resentment and rebellion. Procrastination kicks in as a defense mechanism. Using the “I-have-to’s,” drives your mind to subconsciously confirm the impression that the task is awful and painful - one you wouldn’t do if you had the free choice.
So shift your thinking away from a “have to” mentality into a “want to” mentality. Realize and accept that you don’t have to do anything you don’t want to do. Even though there may be serious consequences, you are always free to choose. Make a conscious choice and commitment to either do the task now, or do what is necessary to get out of it. Don’t let it linger around in the back of your mind.
Remember, there is no time like the present, and by taking care of things right away, you’ll always remain one step ahead of the game in the future. So try to remove “next time” from your vocabulary unless next time becomes this time.
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Well said Ririan. Viji
About Tip #1 , How can we decide…on th limit of giving up perfectionism…We Do most of the work for getting a mental satisfaction… even if we embrace imperfection … will it not increase our inferiority complex in due course?
Right. What about overestimation of capacity? I know the slogan “everything is possible” rules. As you say we are humans and have limits. For example, we have limited talents and can not face every competition in our life. Sometimes, “I will do it tomorrow” could mean: “Avoid this. Look for an other challange.”
viji, thank you my friend.
Dr. Howtolife, the truth is that while we might overestimate what we can do in the short term, we tend to underestimate what we can do in the long. And if you want a surefire way to explode your personal growth remember this maxim:
“If something scares you but is good for you; and especially if you feel you can’t do it, then you must.”
Nice tips. Assuming our task as an obligation is indeed a wrong way to look at it. The influence brought by the nature of our work is probably the reason why we think that way.
Those are great ideas.
When doing a task I usually break it up into small chunks wherein it is manageable. This way, it isn’t overwhelming anymore and it gets me motivated since it’s already easy to accomplish.
I have been afflicted with this disease for as long as I can remember. Only recently I had decided to do something about it. The ideas above are great and I am sure I will be able to overcome procrastination sooner than I thought.
Howie, the breakthrough is when you understand that you are always free to choose. And if you don’t like where you’ve ended up, you’re free to start making different decisions, and new results will follow.
Pamela, great tip. Small progresses eventually do add up to the greater progresses. And as you achieve each step your confidence will grow and you will also achieve a sense of mastery over the issue.
Girish Gopal, it is natural to avoid things that are unpleasant, tiring, difficult, or anxiety provoking. The first line of defense against procrastination is simple: GET STARTED NOW!
Well written article on procrastination, once you learn to overcome this problem the world quickly becomes your personal playground of opportunity.
I found your site on technorati and read a few of your other posts. Keep up the good work. I just added your RSS feed to my Google News Reader. Looking forward to reading more from you down the road!