One major outbreak in the world of mental imbalance is Procrastination. Unknowingly or knowingly we have definitely become its target. Consider the scenario: Work or home, simply sitting and doing nothing is the favorite pass time for most of us. Few other things what we commonly do are day-dreaming, checking emails or phone, chit-chat with co-workers, attend unnecessary meetings and coffees. Yet another amazing thing we do is when the work is assigned is shoot the following words: “Let’s look into that tomorrow”. This is how our daily responsibilities overwhelm us by delaying or postponing any action we plan. Since there is no bomb threat, we kick back and relax and when once we are at the deadline we get extremely exhausted, and that’s when we panic.
Procrastination is a terrible habit we all have. During childhood days, extremely diligent with our work, when we were at school which was a good discipline in our life. But where did it vanish as we grew up? With time, work pressure and commitments, we more or less occupy ourselves with distractions, unnecessary things that take a lot of time, where we sit back and watch people reacting on silly stuff like:
“Oh no that celebrity is getting married”
“Wow she is so beautiful”
“He is everyone’s favorite”
“He is so damn rich and successful”
Then we hit the bed thinking about unnecessary thoughts, rather than developing skills for being more productive!!
(Simple Challenge to all the readers: If you are not suffering with procrastination, prove it by reading the entire article at one short)
Some of the common causes of Procrastination and their cures:
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We always want to outperform or be at the top and at the same time we fear the outcome if we fail:
To overcome this:
- Give yourself some personal time, Gaze it down, get connected to it, and experience it emotionally and sensationally.
- If you gain confidence and create consciousness, soon it will become easy to conquer any challenge.
- Accept the fact that unless you fail, you will never out-perform yourself.
- Your competition should be with yourself and not with your colleagues. Do better than the previous day.
- Always keep in your mind that, it’s not about failing, it’s about failing to try again.
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Deprived of strength or power, leads to feeling helplessness:
To overcome this:
- We always succumb to internal politics in the company; e.g. you do the work and your senior takes the credit. In such scenarios, it’s very important that you recall and remember your previous success you earned by conquering the most complex task.
- Think of the time you were really on top of things, achieving great results.
- Remember, you can survive without your senior, but he won’t be able to do so without you.
- Speak to yourself – “You were the best and you will be the best for the same”, get your mindset with positive vibes and start working.
- Don’t forget unless you encounter new challenge’s, you will not improve yourself.
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Self vilian/Rebeller:
- Rebellious procrastinator avoids “any kind of structure”, “any kind of method” and “any kind of system” and consider themselves above all of this.
- People who are “non-professional winger” i.e. people whose ego is bigger than their bank account. The behavior of these kinds of personalities which takes rebellion to more extreme are:
- “I am talented alone – I am sure I don’t need any practice”.
- “I don’t really have to study I will just show up and take the test”,
To overcome this:
- One must realize if you want to recover, then you need a system, some structure, a method, a 90-day game plan, some clearly defined short-term goals and the daily method you operate in and if you don’t have a system, then you have a system to fail.
- One must definitely do hard work and practice; Practice makes not only man but even woman perfect.
- For you to be a rebel, you first need to learn everything, master everything and then call yourself a rebel. Until then, stop procrastinating and start working.
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Lack of motivation:
To overcome this:
- Take up a goal, make up your own rewards and promise yourself for the same. Ensure, you notice how good it feels after rewarding your own self. Read How to make SMART goals.
- You can also ask someone to check up on you.
- Read a book.
- Identify your own consequences that are stopping you from completing any particular task.
- Most of us are confident and motivated but we lack discipline which is essential for us to remain motivated every time. Hence be disciplined always.
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Lack of focus and fatigue:
To overcome this:
- Seclude yourself and minimize your distractions.
- “Don’t be Dangling over the shore” – Turn off your phone and other social media distractions until you complete that specific task.
- Set time intervals to check your emails, voicemails, blogs, Articles etc.
- Get enough of sleep, Exercise and eat healthily and avoid taking heavy food at the time of work, eat light.
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You don’t think you’ll be effective at a given task:
To overcome this:
- One should adopt ‘No failure mindset’ to reduce self-doubt.
- We all come across situations where we think “this task is not my cup of tea, I don’t even know how to do this!” – If the task is on your plate, it means you are capable of completing it. Hence take up the challenge, build the required skill-set and execute it.
- Don’t stop yourself with unproven predictions, whereas experiment and see the outcome and don’t bother about the failure
“Anyone who stops learning is old, whether at twenty or eighty anyone who keeps learning stays young”
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Your time estimates are…a little off!
To overcome this:
- No one is perfect; not even some movie actor Make a habit of having a buffer in every task you do; may it be a simple known task or complicated unknown task. Always add a buffer.
- Don’t wait till the good times hit your door, rather try completing it quickly. This will compensate for any deficiencies in time estimation.
- Don’t forget to reward yourself on completing each milestone which will keep you boosted for completion of the tasks!!
8. Focus more on the ‘gains of the present’ than the ‘gains of the future’:
To overcome this:
- Don’t think about the future more and let today go in vain. Intend to do right things TODAY and tomorrow will accordingly be set.
- Improve your capability every day and concentrate on the present and never degrade learning.
- Never give up enthusiasm on an everyday task you perform.
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Discomfort intolerance leads you to disengage from the task:
To overcome this:
- Challenge your beliefs about tolerating discomfort and see the differences.
- Speak and encourage yourself to engage in a task like saying “you can complete it within an hour, that’s simple as a cake walk for me”.
- Stick with it and start seeing discomfort as a prerequisite for growth, rather than as the enemy.
- After completing a particular task do something that you like doing often, you can
- Grab a yum piece of cake
- Check your Facebook account
- Take a quick break
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Depression:
To overcome this:
- Teach yourself to break your tasks into smaller and more manageable chunks.
- Ruling out physical causes for your mood or anxiety and knowing its treatment, will help you to set achievable goals, given your condition.
- Get yourself around right people, who bet and see the world with the positive influence which will help you to assimilate with those people.
- Meditate; it’s one of the best solutions to get rid of depression.
To conclude, Procrastination is a deadly disease which tricks our brain so badly that after a certain period of time it turns into habit and addiction which is quite tough to change. Hence, if any of you have any symptoms of procrastination, talk about it, make a plan and implement it till that PROCRASTINATION is completely destroyed.
Do you ever felt procrastinated? How do you kill procrastination? Do share us your views in the comment section below.
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Very insightful post. Thanks for sharing.