I always thought of procrastination being the visible side of lack of discipline. While reading The Productivity Project by Chris Bailey, I learned that procrastination is, in fact, human nature. The book even states that “Depending on your work, you may procrastinate for more than two hours every day.” Two hours! That’s 1/4th of a work day. Gone. Just like that.
That said, procrastination time does not necessarily equal time wasted, if you spend that time on other things that need to be done anyway. However, I do believe that whatever other useful task you are working on, you are working on it with a nagging feeling and a part of your subconscious will still be with the task you are procrastinating on. You might not be wasting time, but you certainly are wasting energy.
My advice would be to just start on the task. The earlier in the day you do it, the better, because as the days goes by, your mental energy and self-discipline decreases, and you will not be able to fight the procrastination urge. Also, have you ever heard of “eat that frog"? It’s a book by Brian Tracy, and the main premise is that if you complete you most difficult task first thing in the morning, the rest of the day will be a walk in the park.
If you really, really, have a hard time getting started, then my second piece of advice would be to just timebox it. Work on the task for 10 minutes, maybe 15, then move on to something else. Who knows, once those 10 or 15 minutes are over you might just continue…
If my two pieces of advice still didn’t get you moving, then let’s return to The Productivity Project and dissect the procrastination phenomenon some more. There are six characteristics of a task that increase the chances of procrastination. The more characteristics you can label your task with, the higher the chance is you will put off completing the task. The six characteristics are:
Boring
Frustrating
Difficult
Unstructured or ambiguous
Lacking in personal meaning
Lacking in intrinsic awards (e.g it’s not fun or engaging)
Fortunately, there are ways to reframe these characteristics and make them more attractive, so that you will act on the tasks rather than delaying them. For instance, if the task is boring, spice it up by blasting some music or treat yourself on a nice beverage while executing the task. Or, if the task is unstructured or ambiguous, break down the task into subtasks and work on the subtasks one by one.
Note: there are two prerequisites for reframing. The first is that you are aware that you are procrastinating on a task, and the second is that you are aware which of these characteristics apply to your task.
I recently discovered that I was procrastinating on a task. For my day job, I had to put together a training on a specific topic, in powerpoint. I was not alone in this, but I did have a significant portion on my plate. The task was so large at first, I had no idea where to start. So I hid behind other work that also needed to be done and put off starting on the powerpoint.
Inspired by a colleague, I blocked 3 hours in my calendar to dedicate to the powerpoint. But that wasn’t enough, the task was still too massive and too looming to get myself to start. I turned to the list of characteristics - by this time I was consciously aware of that fact that I was procrastinating, though I did know deep down - and labeled the powerpoint with the following characteristics:
Difficult
Unstructured
Lacking in intrinsic awards
It’s always easier to solve a problem when you know what the problem is. So, now that I had figured out my obstacles, I could deal with them. To make the task less difficult and more structured, I broke it down into actionable steps (e.g. gather materials related to the topic, sort the materials into categories, design an outline for my slides, etc.) and determined the order in which I had to carry out those steps. The third problem was a bit harder to tackle. Until I saw a bar of chocolate in my fridge. Problem solved! For each 30 minutes that I worked on my slides (really worked, not half worked, half procrastinated on Instagram) I allowed myself a piece of chocolate. I thought I had outgrown the phase in which I could still be bribed with chocolate, but at that point I was desparate for a solution.
In the end, I worked the full 3-hour block, repeated the process two weeks later, and finished the slides in time for the training.
One final note: yes, it takes time to analyze your own procrastination behavior, but I really believe that it is time well spent, because it helps you break through your own barriers. Do not get tempted to spend time on other tasks instead, tackle your procrastination head-on.
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