When I think of all the time that I wasted avoiding things I shouldn’t, I would probably be 10 years younger being where I am in my life today. Dealing with procrastination is serious business because it may seem so harmless, but only with time do you find out that it’s what cost you a passing grade, an important sale, a chance at stardom or in my case, the last decade.
Nevertheless, from failure comes strength and improvement, and through trial and error, I gathered some pretty obvious yet successful methods on how to deal with procrastination. And just recently, I took an online course on Learning how to Learn on coursera.org (free by the way) which not only confirmed that I was on the right track, but also empowered me with more great tips.
- Minimize the use of willpower. As Dr. Barbara Oakley mentions in the cour
se, willpower uses a lot of resources and should not be used unnecessarily. Ask yourself, what are the triggers that make you procrastinate? The computer screen? Smartphone? Friends? Family? Tv? Yeah, you know what to; remove it or remove yourself. Get into your focus zone easily and only apply willpower at small points – your reaction to a procrastination cue.
se, willpower uses a lot of resources and should not be used unnecessarily. Ask yourself, what are the triggers that make you procrastinate? The computer screen? Smartphone? Friends? Family? Tv? Yeah, you know what to; remove it or remove yourself. Get into your focus zone easily and only apply willpower at small points – your reaction to a procrastination cue.- The Pomodoro (Italian for tomato) technique works! Invented by Francesco Cirillo in the 80’s, this technique involves undistracted hard focus on the task for 25 minutes (You can change the time) followed by a reward you give yourself. This could be anything you want like surfing on the web, chatting with a friend, having a snack, or perhaps the things you removed from tip #1. Remember that this simple technique can only work if you really want it to work. Intentions and belief plays a major part in our everyday life. Believe in the Tomato!
- Break the task into smaller tasks, and focus on the process and not the product.The reason why we put off work is because the thought of something dreadful activates the area of the brain associated with pain, so we steer towards more pleasant tasks instead. For example, turn the task to “Create a new blog” into that of “Brainstorming ideas for blog content”. This way, your task becomes a lot more appealing and accomplishable, which will in turn motivate you with some more tasks ! Yeay!
- Keep a sequenced to-do list and add a check box for each task. This favourite activity of mine will give structure and add some discipline in your life. For me, there’s nothing worse than seeing unchecked boxes. Remember to keep the tasks small so you can check them boxes!
- Join a club if you need to! For many of us who have personal projects or goals, it’s really hard to take our deadlines seriously. Join an organization so that you feel the pressure to complete a certain task. You want to be a better dancer? Take a class with an end-of-term performance. You want to write poems? slot yourself in an open mic event. You will have no choice but to be ready!
If you can’t deal with the onslaught of procrastination, all of your smarts or talents really go to waste. Ya, please don’t do that.
Feature photo By Lynn Friedman via http://imagefinder.co/
Photo by Erato via it.wikinews and by Pip Wilson via http://imagefinder.co/
