First of all, I am not going to tell you how to stop procrastination. There are several good books to tell you how to do this. I list two very good ones at the end. I am going to go a bit deeper. As the saying goes, if you want to get rid of a weed, you have to dig out the root. We all know what procrastination is. Most of us know what creates procrastination. But why do we procrastinate? What are those underlying circumstances that make us put off the inevitable? The answer is very simple. Fear. Fear of failure, fear of inadequacy, and even fear of success. Now you’re saying, “you had me listening until you said fear of success”. It is true. People are afraid to succeed.
Let me give you an example. At work, you have a circle of friends. About 3 months ago, bob got a promotion. Bob was a great guy. He would have done anything for you. About a month ago you noticed bob changing. He started to hang out with your circle of friends less often. Now he barely says hi to you in the hall. When he does talk to you, he talks about things that seem beyond you. To top that, he’s always traveling and never seems to be home. You hear the people talking around the water cooler. I would never want to be like bob. In fact, he’s kind of a jerk now. What has happened? Now, in your mind, you equate success as a bad thing. You don’t want to be a jerk. You like your friends and you certainly don’t like bob’s new friends. You have successfully talked yourself out of succeeding. So let’s think for a moment. Do we have to turn into bob? Can we succeed and still be a nice person? The answer is yes we can. I have had several friends turned from coworker to boss. I will admit, some turned into jerks. The majority, if anything, turned into nicer people. I will tell you this. Our buddy bob, was always a jerk. He just did not know how to express it.
I will give you another example. Losing weight and exercising produces some of the biggest procrastinators I’ve ever seen. Once again, we are talking about fear. This time, it is fear of pain and acceptance. Before we start on a diet or exercise routine, in our heads, we make a pain pleasure list. We go over certain pains that we will feel when working out as well as the pleasures that working out will bring. At first, the pleasures seem to outweigh the pains and we begin our routine. But somewhere down the line we tally that list again and find the pains overwhelm the pleasures and we give up. It may be because we do not see the fruits of our labor as soon as we like. Because we all know that we are a microwave society. We want results in the quickest possible way. Let’s go a bit deeper with this. What else are we afraid of? If I do lose the weight, will my friends feel strange to be around me? Will I have to eat good foods solely for the rest of my life? All these questions go bouncing through our heads. We think about them, but we are not aware of them.
Like I said before, I am not going to tell you how you can stop procrastination. My whole goal here was to make you aware of what causes procrastination. Procrastination is not the problem. The problem is the underlying reasons you procrastinate. Things like low self esteem, perfectionism, fear of failure, and fear of success. There is much more to procrastination than I have mentioned here, but this is not a book, this is a blog. I am always amazed at the lack of education after a person finishes college. We spend a good part of our youth learning. I find life is the hardest subject I’ve ever come up against. We need to learn about life. When it throws us a curve, we need to be ready for it. It was easy to learn how to procrastinate. It is just as easy to learn how not to procrastinate. Do yourself a favor and learn about life.
Here are the books I recommend on procrastination
The Now Habit: A Strategic Program for Overcoming Procrastination and Enjoying Guilt-Free Play
Getting Things Done: The Art of Stress-Free Productivity
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