Understanding procrastination and counter methods
“ By action comes motivation not the other way round because energy follows movement”.
We are all guilty of delaying important tasks till the last moment even though we know the consequence,
whether it’s a project deadline or asking your girl out. It is always tomorrow not today.
I myself delayed writing these blogs from college time until now .
I have found insight into the whole game of procrastination and beat it, this blog is proof of that.
In this blog, we will understand what procrastination is actually, how it comes about, and practical methods to beat procrastination for real , No B.S.
What does Procrastination mean actually?
Procrastination is avoiding tasks that we feel too much to take and in place doing tasks that are easy and provide instant pleasure like scrolling FB feed, youtube video.
Think of a scenario – you have a project submission tomorrow and you haven’t started it yet,
but you can’t put yourself to complete it the whole day but at night you feel extreme pressure to complete it otherwise you will get 0 grade in that subject.
So you pull an all-nighter to complete it, this is a classic example of procrastination that everyone can relate to.
Is Procrastination a habit or psychological issue?
Our brain has become very smart during evolution, it itself tries to save its energy by avoiding a difficult task that is not built for the survival of the body.
Whenever a task is too overwhelming to do, there will be no motivation produced by the mind.
This is the reason why we can do procrastinated tasks under fear , because at that moment it becomes very necessary for the body to get out of fear
Psychological factors in procrastination
1) Reasonable center of mind (your good friend )
This part generates thoughts and tasks that will be actually helpful for you in the longer run.
Such as – starting a new career, new business, reading books, etc.
2) Unreasonable center of mind (your bad friend )
This will keep you away from the important task by any means possible and keep you at work that is easy and pleasurable for the moment but,
In the longer run, it will not be beneficial for you.
such as – Netflix, binge, youtube, FB feed scroll
3) Fear (monster )
This is the state where your whole body and mind are screaming “alert” and you don’t have any other way other than to get out of this problem.
So you complete the task in a hurry and get out of the procrastinated task but your work quality suffers so as your outcome.
But good thing is that procrastination can be dealt with ease.
How to stop Procrastination sensibly
I am giving below the exact method that i used to remove my habit of procrastination but it will only work when you apply it right now not tomorrow.
Step 1 ) Fixing your wrong mindset about motivation and action
We all have a common misconception which i also had before, that we need the motivation to start an action.
So we wait for motivation to come either in some form of crisis or some people pushing us.
But what if I tell you that is the wrong path altogether?
What if I say that Only after you start an action there follows the motivation?
For example- I wanted to start a successful blog in my college days but I couldn’t because I was not motivated enough,
But one day something struck me that the big goal to make a blog of 10K+ daily visitors is the main reason for my demotivation to start it.
So i made my task easy to start rather than thinking about writing a perfect blog my goal is to just start writing the heading.
Similarly, you can apply this to other things like going to the gym.
Rather than thinking about going to the gym, workout, people and all, just make a task of dressing up and going to the gym.
You will feel motivated as you start acting and find that the most difficult part was to just start.
Step 2 ) Make your actions easy to start
Always make your actions very easy to start and once you start the work then you will keep doing it that’s how the mind works.
for example – starting a successful business is a large project with multiple steps in between.
So if I think about all the problems and hurdles and difficulties, I will just say fuck this I am gonna watch some cat videos.
But nothing is done to reach the goal, so instead if I start working on just a small part of the task that will lead me to the final goal ultimately
Like working in the marketing area of my business, then it is an achievable task and by taking action comes motivation.
Step 3 ) Just start and your mind will take care of the next step
There is a pattern in mind, if you just start something then the mind will take care of the next step by itself.
So if you are waiting to be in perfect condition to start, then most probably you will end up skipping it.
Step 4 ) Choose a small task you can do right now
Just choose a small task around the big goal which seems very overwhelming to you and start taking action on it.
For example, I was anxious to talk with people but rather than thinking about the whole conversation and getting struck
I make my mind to just walk toward the person
and my mind automatically due to awkwardness did the next step to just start simple hi, hello then I become friend of her after a few conversations.
Takeaway
@ Procrastination is just mind being lazy that wants to avoid too heavy a task
@Making tasks that is easy to start so you can take action on it right now.
@Rather than thinking about all the possible futures, making a small and doable task right now and execute on it.
@Where action goes energy flows.
Readers like you are my motivation to write, thank you for reading.
Excellent blog, keep posting more.
Thank you for your compliment, i will post regular updates .