Why you procrastinate and what you can do about it
Notes to self #1
I have been taking notes all over the place for as long as I can remember. You know the feeling that you get when you say “Oh, I read it somewhere but I do not remember where and what were the details.”
In this Notes to self series my aim is to gather around and summarize the key points of what I read, listen to, watch or hear.
On to the first note. This one comes from the article below:
- According to research people tend to procrastinate not because they are lazy, but because of the poor emotional management and low self-regulation skills.
- You have to realize what kind of emotions are keeping you from getting the job done. Here is a strong quote from the article:
To overcome the habit of procrastination, we need to address emotions and thoughts about the outcome of completing certain tasks. *
3. We actually procrastinate because we see the anxiety, stress, problems, and necessary efforts with the related task. We prefer short-term happiness by checking out our Instagram likes, instead of sticking to studying for the finals. Finals are hard, challenging and a risk to our credibility. Our future self is always at war with our current self. You have to learn to supress current self by regulating your daily flow.
Research on aspects of mental health such as depression, anxiety, and finer aspects like poor confidence in abilities, worrying, negative thinking, perfectionism, ADHD, etc. predict procrastination like behaviors. At the heart of those, there is emotional dysregulation — a known source of procrastinatory behaviors and habits. Even your ability to concentrate and focus on work is related to procrastination because a lack of motivation and forcing yourself to work/study is a source of negative emotions.
4. Negative mood generally will lead to procrastination, but not vice versa. So if you have big things to cover, try to optimize your morning. Get minimum of 7 hours of sleep, do some Tony Robbins breathing maybe, grind coffee and drink a fresh Colombia Medellin if you can, put your most-loved playlist in the background, use some positive affirmations “You can do it, smartass”, Stay away from the distractions by leaving your phone in another room, and use your yoga practice: whenever you realize you are distracted by thoughts come back to the current task at hand.
5. Use this routine to calm your body and motivate yourself:
6. Journaling about the day and anxieties might also work to reduce your stress level.
7. Just start. And give yourself 5 minutes. Nobody said it better than Nike when it says “Just Do It”. James Clear says it best when he says “ Motivation comes not at the beginning, but after the start.”
8. Relax before sleep as much as you can by stretching, doing some yoga, maybe a little breathing exercise, meditation. Whatever suits you. Do not eat after 6 pm, unless you have to.
9. Pomodoro also might work, as cited in the article. But do not go for 25–5, that is too low. Go for 45–10 cylcles. When you just start, you will be getting into flow after initial ten minutes, do not break that flow. And how you get into flow ? Glad you asked. Here is a splendid resource.
Or use this:
Quote of the day :
“Any person capable of angering you becomes your master;
he can anger you only when you permit yourself to be disturbed by him.”
― Epictetus
Cheers.
