Dealing with Procrastination

What is procrastination, its effects and remedies to mitigate it

Introduction:

Procrastination has adverse effects on the outcome of what we can achieve as a developer, person, student, programmer, and teacher, all the same. We all do procrastinate. Some do more, some do less. Some of us find better ways to deal with it. Others, can’t deal with it well. And clearly, some of us don’t have any idea what’s going on, least of all knowing how to deal with it.

History of procrastination:

Procrastination is nothing new. 10 thousand years ago, the ancient Greek philosophers even had a word for it, akrasia. Akrasia is described as a lack of self-control or the state of acting against one's better judgment through weakness of will. It is possible to act against one's better judgment, even though not being a weak-willed person. Despite its ancient history, it’s probably even more prevalent today. Because we live in a world full of distractions and perfect procrastination temptations.

Who is this article for?

Let’s put it straight. If you know what you want to do with your life and have some set goals to achieve. But, you're looking for ways to avoid temptations that continuously hinder your way to achieving your goals. A lot of temptations always stop you from doing your most important task. Then this article can surely help you to rethink your priorities and find a solution.

What is Procrastination?

Procrastination is the action of unnecessarily and voluntarily delaying or postponing something, despite knowing that there will be negative consequences for doing so. There are a lot of ways of thinking about and approaching procrastination. We can think of it as a bad habit, for instance. So that we can overcome it, flourish, and truly thrive in our lives. Be it in our work as developers, engineers, programmers, teachers, and as learners.

Have you ever Procrastinated?

Did you ever ask yourself this question? No? Alright, let me ask you. Please nod if you ever procrastinated. Don’t be shy, I won’t judge you. Yeah, I see you nodding. We all do procrastinate except for superhumans, i.e., the likes of Elon Musk. I bet he procrastinates too, at least a few times in his life. It’s just that he may get it over with relatively easily. Hence, he’s one of the most productive people on our planet.

Even productivity gurus have professed that they struggle at overcoming procrastination big time.

So, almost all of us procrastinate more or less. No prob, if we do. The best part is how we deal with it. Let's try to overcome it. Or at least let's try to minimize it to the point that it doesn’t affect us badly. Yes! Of course, you can do it.

Is it good or bad to procrastinate?

Procrastination is a big…big problem. And we should be fair and honest enough, to admit it as a bad habit. That’s the first step to overcoming it, or any other bad habit, for that matter. Firstly, understand that procrastination is a bad habit and like all habits, it can be changed.

Let me try to help you to understand it in a different ethical and moral sense. Procrastination is not shameful, it’s not a weakness, and it’s not a flaw. It’s pretty predictable. It is something we expect if we understand the dynamics of motivation and the circumstances under which it arises.

The weird thing is that at certain times, we can’t afford to procrastinate. Hence, we should take some time to figure out ways to avoid those situations.

Causes of Procrastination:

The basic psychological idea behind all the causes of Procrastination is:

Instant gratification and short-term mood repair over the long-term pursuit.

e.g., watching a 30-min YT tutorial video on a coding topic rather than coding (say 2 hours every day continuously for a longer period). In other words, procrastination is more about being focused on the immediate urgency of managing negative moods and pushing the problem away, rather than getting on with the most important task in the present moment. There are a lot of factors that can cause procrastination.

A list of factors that can be the cause of procrastination is:

• Feeling lost and lack of clarity

• Lack of Motivation

• Undisciplined life

• Bad Habits

• Lack of Commitment

• Unrealistic Goals

• Imposter Syndrome

• Incorrect Priorities

• Can’t find momentum

• Lost on where to start

• Lacking a sense of responsibility

• A cluttered working environment

• Fear of not succeeding

• Environmental distractions (family, friends, electronic gadgets etc.)

• Feeling overwhelmed by too much work

Practical Steps to Avoid Procrastination?

The most important part of avoiding procrastination is to identify it as a problem. Then you try to find the motivation to change yourself. You see, you have a problem, and you’re ready to change it for good.

Here are some practical steps that can help you to deal with procrastination:

1. Have clarity

Having clarity is one of the important points for overcoming procrastination or any other problem, for that matter. That starts with understanding your personality type. Then understanding your aims and goals for the kind of life you want to have. If we don’t have clarity of aims and goals, we can be living a purposeless life. To have the motivation to stop procrastination, you need to find purpose/s in life. Those can be some set goals you want to achieve, or they can be the life that you aspire to live.

Furthermore, you should be clear about everything you do. What you're doing. Why you're doing it? What do you want to achieve as a result of that?

2. Find your motivation

Motivation can only operate on us if we’re thinking of it or feeling it. Because that’s the nature of motivation.

Two ways to approach motivation:

1. Get motivation and use it to get things done.

2. You get something done and then the motivation naturally follows. Set goals in form of smaller tasks, finish some of them and get more motivation to keep going.

See what works for you better (between 1 & 2), then go with it.

3. Discipline and Habits

Self-Discipline is the key to avoiding procrastination

The difference between the life you’re living and the life you want to live or could have lived is defined by Discipline and Habits. Having a disciplined life followed by habits is what makes the difference.

Discipline is the energy that we’ve put into the system. We’re using our willpower. We’re being disciplined, we are doing the thing. But then once we do the thing often enough, it becomes a habit and we don’t need willpower (anymore) to do habits. Like I don’t need the willpower to brush my teeth every night, but I do need the discipline to get up and go to the gym because going to the gym has not yet become a habit.

Remove the temptations for distractions. Create a daily schedule for how you’re going to work on a project and stick to it. Set your deadlines a bit earlier than they should be, just in case something unexpected happens.

4. Set priorities and commit to act

Prioritizing our tasks is very crucial to avoid procrastination. By doing so we are putting the most important ones first. If we always put simpler and easier tasks first, we might end up completing them, all the time. But, this can leave out the most important tasks. Remind yourself of the consequences if you didn’t take action.

5. Make friends with Procrastination

Yes, you read it right. Make friends with procrastination. Take breaks and allow yourself to “procrastinate” for a set amount of time. It can be a good approach for those people who find it very hard to deal with and overcome procrastination. So, how do you make friends with Procrastination? The answer is Creative Procrastination. That is, use the procrastination time for doing something thinking-related. What that means is, you can’t give up procrastination at once, ok fine. Let’s procrastinate but in a different and better way.

How? Here is how.

You are not feeling to do your important work/assignment. Rather, you want to play the video game you love or watch a movie/Netflix show. Ok fine. Let’s not work on our important work/assignment. But also, let’s not follow our temptation to do useless activities that we do as procrastinators. Instead, what we can do is think about ways to finish our task while watching Netflix or whatever.

6. Just Start

The key insight here is that most of the resistance that we feel when doing a task is just in the act of starting. Resistance is a universal force that has one sole mission, to keep things as they are, preventing action, creativity, and progress. In other words, resistance provides the beating heart of procrastination. So, the best remedy is to just start, even if you can start small. No problem.

7. Stop Complaining and Take Responsibility

It’s not a good practice to always complain about external factors, or blame other people for your failures. Take responsibility for your failures on yourself, and give credit to others for your successes.

8. Build momentum

Set small & manageable targets. That is, set realistic goals. Don't take on more than you can manage. Make your tasks small and manageable targets. i.e., Split large and difficult tasks into simpler, more manageable ones. Make small improvements continuously.

Remember, slow progress is the best progress. This helps to build momentum. It can also help us to be more consistent in what we’re doing. Furthermore, you can change your pace whenever you feel comfortable doing it.

9. Stay Humble & Helpful

How this can work when you try to be humble and helpful. It takes away the pressure on you to be “awesome”. That way you can better focus on your goals and achieve more.

10. Work for specific amounts of time

Work for specific amounts of time, so you know when to start and how long to work for. Working for smaller chunks of time is better than not working at all. Few ways to accomplish that:

• 2-minute rule

You'll try to accomplish something that'll take only 2 minutes. e.g, refill your water bottle.

• 5-minute rule

You give five minutes to some important task. This can be useful when you're not feeling motivated to do an important task. So, you say to yourself, I'm only gonna do it for 5 minutes and that's all. If it turns out to be fun and you find your momentum, you might end up working for 30 minutes or an hour.

• Mind activation rule

This rule means: When you have the instinct to act on a goal you must act on it immediately (or within five seconds) — otherwise your brain will start leaning towards procrastination.

• Pomodoro Technique

You divide your time into smaller chunks, work for 25 minutes and take a 5-minute break. I’m trying this one and it’s working for me well.

11. Imposter Syndrome

Imposter Syndrome is also a cause of procrastination, or we can better put it this way; Procrastination triggers imposter syndrome.

12. Be accountable

Keep yourself accountable; let others and yourself know what you’re going to do and what your goals are. There are two beliefs: i. Don’t just say, act. Let your actions speak for you, not your words. ii. Commit to something 1st publicly, and then do it.

Usually, it is believed that 1st point is a better approach. But in some cases, when we are trying to overcome procrastination. It’s a more useful approach to follow the second option above. When we commit to something publicly, the results are going to be better than when we just commit only to ourselves. The point is when you share your thought first, your reputation is at stake and it gives you an extra push to do your tasks.

Note: You have to be careful with this. Don't commit if you can't deliver, and make sure to deliver if you have committed. Know your limitations (strengths & weaknesses) before committing to something. For example, I committed to writing this article only because I have been feeling to write on this topic for quite a while. And, I felt I can do this well. Based on my experiences dealing with procrastination and my writing skills (which I think are not that bad).

Conclusion:

All of us, do procrastinate, at times. I have shared some tips and suggestions, that helped me to better deal with procrastination. I hope some of them can also be helpful to you. Try to find out what works for you well, and give it a shot.

Good luck to you all. Wish you all the best in overcoming it.💪

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