So you've tried every productivity hack out there.
You've done a productivity course and built your own productivity system.
But you still can't stop procrastinating.
And you start to wonder... "what's wrong with me??"
It's not you.
It's the procrastination-productivity myth that's been holding you back.
And until very recently, this was happening to me too.
So I'm here to do a little myth-busting.
Procrastination doesn’t mean you’re lazy
There's technically, uh, nothing wrong with leaving things to the last minute, if you
actually do them at the last minute
This is Jorge Cham, a cartoonist and creator of PhD Comics – which explores procrastination
a lot
I consider myself an expert procrastinator to the, to the point where it's sort of a
way of life for me to be honest.
Which makes Jorge very experienced in what people get wrong about procrastination.
You know, my big thing is that there's a big difference between procrastination and laziness.
You know, laziness is when you don't want to do anything procrastination, you just don't
want to do it now.
We get stuck in the procrastination guilt trap
Now, this distinction matters because if we think that we’re lazy and then we start
to act in a lazy way, we just start feeling bad about ourselves.
You could say that we feed our inner critic.
So, we get stuck in this procrastination guilt trap where we feel bad that we’re procrastinating,
we procrastinate more, and then we just feel worse about ourselves.
And that is not helpful.
And being able to manage our inner critic is so crucial in being able to manage procrastination,
because so much of procrastination is actually caused by our thoughts and feelings.
So, now with a pad of paper and a giant llama, I’m going to illaminate– sorry illuminate
four ways that you can overcome procrastination.
1.
Forgive yourself.
For starters it’s super important to forgive yourself.
So, self-compassion is really, really crucial to getting out of the guilt trap: And research
shows that students who forgave themselves for procrastinating when they were meant to
be studying for an exam were less likely to procrastinate the next time their exams came
around.
2.
Stop using “should” statements Next up, we can all try to stop using “should”
statements.
So, your inner critic loves to use “should” statements, so we “should” be getting
a certain amount of exercise today, or we “should” be following this morning routine.
I had a professor who really challenged us to think about what the word “should”
means.
Like when we say things like, Oh, I really should be, um, working on this, or I really
should be cleaning my kitchen.
If you sort of think about what the word “should” means.
It's really not a word that makes a lot of sense by itself.
If you catch yourself using a “should” statement, you can try to reframe it with
a little bit more self-compassion: So you might think if you do actually enjoy exercising,
you might think that, “exercising makes me feel good.”
Or you might think, “following this morning routine actually helps me manage stress.”
3.
Imagine working through the task
Another thing you can do is imagine working through a task.
We often use procrastination to avoid discomfort, which could be having a tough conversation,
thinking through a hard problem, or something like sending a difficult email.
One way that we can get better at both starting and doing these tasks is by sitting down and
imagining working through that task, working through the thing we have been avoiding doing
in practice just by thinking through all of the steps in our head.
It helps to do it mentally before we do it physically.
And finding things to help you deal with discomfort is really useful as well – so this can be
breathing exercises, or meditation, or maybe just binge watching Schitt’s Creek.
And finally, give yourself permission to rest.
So, we often procrastinate by going to get a snack or check our phones or find ourselves
browsing the web because we don’t schedule enough breaks into our daily routine.
So, if you’re working from home, or studying, plan to take a break every 15 mins for every
hour of work.
I know that seems like a lot, but if you schedule more of these small breaks, you’ll be less
likely to procrastinate by going to take breaks yourself.
Now my main message here is don’t beat yourself up about productivity!
Hustle culture and thinking that you need to optimize everything can be really harmful.
For me, thinking about why I was procrastinating, independent of productivity helped me realize
why I was delaying everything and how I could better deal with those tasks.
I could better deal with them and myself.
Procrastination is its own beast, and the techniques to overcome it are way different
from being more productive.
So remember that, and good luck.