Procrastination

 

Just when Dr. Sundardas was about to give up trying to understand procrastination, he came across a theory that completely changed the way he thinks about procrastination. It opened him deeper into the role of our emotions, making him more sympathetic towards his clients. He takes us into that and tells us the reasons why we procrastinate, as backed by studies, and how we can overcome it. If you are curious about it, then read on and figure out the truth about procrastination.

—

Listen to the podcast here:

 

Procrastination

 

I’ve read all the articles and listened to all the podcasts about procrastination. I never really understood why other people procrastinated. I know why I did. Sometimes they hate work. Sometimes an article about how bad of habit procrastination is will kick me into gear and help me get things done early for a change. That justified given that I’m trying to understand it. I came across Theory of Procrastination I never heard of and it completely changed the way I think about procrastination. It made me more sympathetic to my clients. The truth is procrastination is more about our emotions. Our tendencies for laziness are just being bad. We procrastinate to keep ourselves happy at the moment, which makes complete sense. That is until we are pulling an all-nighter to meet that client deadline we have weeks to prepare for.

Understanding why we procrastinate allows us to develop effective strategies for getting started on not only important projects rather than waiting for tomorrow. Here’s what I’ve discovered in my own journey to stop putting things off for later and the concrete steps I found along the way to address the root cause of my procrastination. Why do we procrastinate? Procrastination is thought to come from an emotional reaction to whatever it is you’re avoiding. Researchers call this phenomenon mood repair where we avoid the uncomfortable feelings associated with our work by spending time on mood enhancing activities like playing games. For me, it is the fear of making a mistake and screwing up. I used to agonize and procrastinate before I start. Now I know better. I will share a secret with you.

We procrastinate because we have the fear of making a mistake and screwing up. Click To Tweet

According to our researcher at Carlton University, putting off the task at hand is an effective way of regulating this mood. Avoid the task, avoid the bad mood. The mood lift is inevitability a short-term. Studies of college students have found the habit of putting things off only increases negative feelings later on. Procrastinators tend to be less stressed and healthy in the first school term, by the second term, these results were actually reversed. This brings us to the second key insight into why we procrastinate. Research shows that our brains are actually wired to think about our present and future selves as two separate people. That’s why we’re able to prioritize our present mood at the expense of our future wellbeing, even though it’s an irrational choice in the long-term.

A study run by UCLA psychologist, Hal Hershfield and a team at Stanford University found that participants actually engaged different areas of their brain when they thought about their present selves versus their future selves. In fact, when people are told to think about themselves in ten years, their brain patterns closely resembled those observed when they were asked to think about celebrities they didn’t know. This separation of present and future self encourages us to make different decisions about ourselves now and in the future. For instance, one study showed people ask the other students to offer to do so less in the present, but will offer more of their time in the future. To sum up the research, we procrastinate because our brains are wired to care more about our present comfort than our future happiness. I love the fact that it contributes to what we call procrastination.

It’s the six stages of change model. The following are the stages that people go through in the journey of change. Precontemplation, not yet acknowledging there is a problem behavior that needs to be changed. Contemplation, acknowledging there is a problem, but not yet ready or sure of one thing to make a change. Then comes the preparation, the determination, getting ready to change. Then comes the stage of action and will power changing their behavior. Then comes maintenance, maintaining the behavior change and then maybe relapse. Returning to old behaviors and abandoning the new ones. The stages of change. Stage one, pre-contemplation. In the precontemplation stage, they’re not interested in changing and don’t want to consider any kinds of help. At this point, they will often be very defensive about their habits, behavior, and lifestyle. Any attempt at changing their behavior or lifestyle is resisted. They will not focus on change and will feel offended. They’re not interested in any kind of change and will not even discuss their bad habit with others.

 

This is the stage in the Alcoholics Anonymous that is called Denial. If you think that you’re in the pre-contemplation stage in some area of your life, consider that you’re already reading this and if you’re ready to take action, you move on. If you are reading this and you’re not ready to take action or you don’t want to think about it, then you’re in the pre-contemplation stage. Stage two, contemplation. In the contemplation stage, you are actually more aware of the personal consequences of your current behavior. You actually spend more time or some time considering options. Often you consider changing. You’re still ambivalent and not committed to change. You think the benefits of change will outweigh the pain of change. In this stage, people are on the chain of thought of weighing the pros and cons of quitting or modifying their behavior. They may consider the negative aspects of the limiting behavior or habit and the positive associates that we’re giving it up or reducing it. However, let me be ambivalent of the long-term habits and benefits of positive change will outweigh the short-term costs. Getting through the contemplation stage meant anything from a few weeks to a lifetime. In fact, for some, it takes so long to consider that they may die before they make up their mind.

On the other hand, they can be more open to receiving information about limiting life choices and more likely to consider interventions and reflect on your own feelings and thoughts concerning the current limiting habits. Stage three is preparation and determination. In the preparation and determination stage, at this point, there is a commitment to change. This is when people are actually committed to doing something and have stopped procrastinating. The motivation for change is reflected by statements such as, “I’ve got to do something about it before it gets worse. I have to change while I still can. What should I do next?” This is the result of the research phase. People are not taking small steps towards making the change. They are actively doing research about what they will need to do to change or they’re trying to find out what strategies and resources are available to help them in the attempt. Too often, people skipped the stage. They’ll try to move directly from contemplation into action and fall flat on their faces because they haven’t adequately researched or accepted what it is and when to take to make this major lifestyle change.

We procrastinate because our brains are wired to care more about our present comfort than our future. Click To Tweet

What can we do about it? Remember I told you that I will give you my big discovery. I realized that what held me back or made me procrastinate was my fear of failure and my fear of making a mistake. Then I realized that every time I learn something new, I was going to make mistakes. The faster I made these mistakes, the sooner I will learn and the sooner I will do it well. Once I got really clear about that, I became really excited about making those mistakes really fast. The second way in which I would get myself motivated about stuff is I would consider some stage or some area of my life that while not terribly limiting was somewhat limiting. Then I would ask myself, “Did I want the situation to carry off in one, two, three, four, five years?” Normally, it was something like my weight or I stopped exercising and I wasn’t exercising as much as I wanted to. The moment I pushed it to two or three years, my awareness of the consequences and what will happen and the amount of catch up that I have to do, became so overwhelming that that gave me the motivation to say, “This must stop right now.”

These two habits, one was future-pacing myself and getting motivated about change. Two, recognizing and learning something new and involve making habits that worked and that I would make mistakes. Once I became aware of these two, my procrastination effectively ended. How do we overcome the procrastination habit? Based on research, it is clear that we have two ways of dealing with our procrastination. Make whatever we are procrastinating on feel less uncomfortable and convince our present self into caring about our future selves. More though, which I spoke about. Investor and entrepreneur, Paul Graham, uses the term group procrastination to mean working on more important things than what you’re avoiding. He says, “Working on errands or unimportant tasks to avoid your real work is bad procrastination. Whereas good procrastination is basically avoiding errands to do real work.” When I talk to people who manage to make themselves to work on big things, I find that all blew off errands and feel guilty about it. I don’t think you should feel guilty. There’s more to do that anyone could. Someone doing their best work they can is inevitably going to need a lot of errands undone.

Graham breaks procrastination into three types depending on what you do instead of a big task you’re avoiding. Number one, you do nothing. Number two, you do something less important. Number three, you do something more important. The trick to good procrastination according to Graham is avoiding the less important, more urgent things on your to-do list. He suggests maybe everything on it to work on really important work like your next big idea, the book you keep saying you want to write. The site project you believe in, but you can’t find time for. This is real work, says Graham. Mowing the lawn and filling your taxes can wait if it means spending big chunks of time in work that really matters. On this podcast, I’m willing to help you to design a life that works so you are able to say yes to the things that matter and eliminate everything else that slows you down. The more clear you can be about how to organize your daily life to support your bigger vision, the more you step into your true potential, stay on track and accomplish all that you want and deserve. Are you ready to make that happen? Feel free to reach out to me to ask a question to AskDrSun.com. Your life is a gift, design it. Do what matters. Join me each week as we get closer to designing the life of your dreams. I’m Dr. Sun, join me on Life by Design.

 

Important Links:

• AskDrSun.com