Starting on a goal can be daunting. You might be so exhausted after work every evening that all you want to do is slump in front of the TV or head to bed early. You may be feeling lethargic and unmotivated, struggling to rouse that spirit of ‘get up and go’. In this state, it is so much easier to give in to tiredness and make no progress towards our ‘something greater’.
It is estimated that as many as a staggering quarter of all adults use chronic procrastination as a coping strategy by swapping short term avoidance instead of thinking about long term gains.
As you can clearly see, if you consider yourself as a procrastinator, you are certainly not alone.
Well, in this post, you will find 7 quick tips to help you get started. In true NFS style, don’t just read this without taking action.
What does procrastination mean?
Procrastination is the action of postponing or delaying something that you would like, or needs, to be done. It often comes with that feeling of dread when the deadline is looming and you’ve not even got started.
Some people attribute procrastination to laziness and it is an easy mistake to make to brand others or ourselves with this negative quality when often, there is a far more reasonable explanation. If you know you are susceptible to putting tasks off, there may just be some tips and tricks to help you overcome procrastination.
The main causes of procrastination
· Perfectionism often rears its head and we worry that this next task may reveal our flaws. We do not like to put our head above the parapet when we may be judged by others.
· We feel overwhelmed by the task or be unclear how to get started
· We think the task will be boring, unpleasant or too difficult
· We have a low opinion of our ability to complete the task successfully
· We wrongly prioritise short term thinking over long term results (eg. its easier to watch TV than start painting the kitchen)
· There are too many distractions in our environment that pull us away from our intended task
· Fear and anxiety about the task clouds our judgement
The negative effects of procrastination
· Procrastination causes anxiety as deadlines approach and tasks build up
· Social and relationship issues of you neglect to take on your share of chores around the house, arrive late for meetings or events and let down co-workers with unfinished project work.
· It chips away at your self-confidence to tackle a task
· Lowered self-esteem as we lose faith in ourselves
· Poor decision making process when time is running out
· Not taking beneficial opportunities offered to you because you put of making a decision.
· Risking physical and mental health by not getting help with medical conditions
· Damaging your reputation to work effectively
· Financial problems as issues are swept under the carpet and not dealt with in a timely fashion
· Procrastination often causes a downward spiral. For example, putting of attending to medical issues, sleep and personal welfare diminishes the ability to apply coping strategies, compounding the problems,
1. Be clear about your next steps.
The decision about which goal to head towards can be overwhelming. Do you start with your fitness, your diet or your mind set? Should you spend time improving your financial literacy or your conversational Spanish? But the house needs tidying and you need to sort out your taxes. Where on Earth do you start?
If you feel like this, then you might just want to check out our blog post about setting your priorities. You can find the link here 11 tricks to choosing your priority actions
However, if you know which goal you are heading for, you need to be clear about the next steps. Think about the order of actions you will need to carry out to reach your goal.
For example, let’s say you have a report to finish for work by next Monday. You have a few days but it is on your mind and know that it must be completed by the deadline. Your next step could be ‘finish report’. However, on thinking about it, you need some annual figures from Claire to work into the middle section. So now you have a choice – ‘write the next part of the report’ or ‘phone Claire for the data’. Which one comes first is up to you.
List the NEXT FEW STEPS that you could take to make progress and choose the most appropriate, or the one that will have the biggest impact. Once this is decided, write the next step in clear, simple language.
Start with an imperative or command word. ‘Write’, ‘research’, ‘plan’ or ‘contact’ are some good examples. Then finish the step by clearly stating the details (who, when, where etc.) For example:
· Contact James for the dates of the trade fair.
· Buy 2 lever arch files for organising finances
· Book Linda’s birthday meal at The Three Horseshoes for 13th of this month.
If your next step is not specific enough, chunk it down into smaller steps. A next step of ‘get insurance before the 15th’ could actually be split up into smaller steps:
· Contact current insurance to discuss renewal quote
· Go on a comparison website to compare alternative insurance deals
· Speak to Harry about whether he is happy with his ‘FabInsurances’R’us’
· Research Martin’s Money Saving website for tricks to legally reduce insurance cost
As you can see, the more specific the next step, the smaller amount of effort you have to expend to get it done, another advantage when fighting overwhelm.
Why does it work?
This technique is useful for finding the easiest next step, ordering your steps and chunking your bigger tasks down into manageable actions. Being clear about an end point helps you to be clear about what success looks like.
The next step: ‘Sort the garden’ is quite nebulous and, because plants have this annoying habit of growing, will never really be finished. The grass grows, the winds blow leaves into the shady corners, you need to re-felt the shed and prune the Virginia Creeper growing on the front of the house.
However, ‘mowing the lawn’ is one simple part of that all-encompassing ‘sorting the garden’ goal that you can be absolutely sure that you’ve completed.
What to be aware of?
It can take some time to really dig down to arrive at the logical next smallest possible step, so don’t let this take over. Focus on spending no more than 3 minutes on your plans and then get into action as soon as possible.
2. The Pomodoro Technique
Developed by Francesco Cirillo in the late 1980s, it is called the Pomodoro technique because it was invented using a tomato-shaped timer (pomodoro being the Italian for tomato) and uses psychology to get you going on a task you might be putting off.
It works very simply. Set a timer for 25 minutes and get going with whatever task you have set yourself. This works for cleaning, revising, working, in fact anything that you are struggling to get started. Work right through for 25 minutes and then take a 5 minute break, before starting the task for a second 25 minute session. Just rinse and repeat.
After 4 sessions, take a longer break of up to 30 minutes before starting again.
Why does it work?
The time period of 25 minutes allows you to be productive without it being intimidating. Knowing you have a break just over the horizon helps you to overcome those feelings of procrastination, whilst also giving you a sense of accomplishment and that little hit of dopamine when you complete and tick off each cycle.
What to be aware of?
Getting into the state of flow helps complete tasks. By artificially stopping yourself mid-way through, your concentration is broken and you can suffer from struggling to regain focus which could take up to 20 minutes.
3. Habit tracking
Committing to work on goals and next steps every day are good ways to build momentum and almost guilt yourself into staying ‘on the roll’. I have a stupid little commitment to always, without fail, remove the fluff build-up from the tumble dryer filter, after hearing from a friend how theirs caught fire one day. And I’ve not missed it once in 2 years!
It is a ridiculously small commitment that takes 20 seconds of my life, but every time my lazy brain suggests that I skip this, the fact that I’ve NEVER yet let the brave men and women of our local fire service down, kick-starts a silly sense of “Not today, sucker! Not today!”
Why does it work?
Commitment is a powerful engine to get you to keep on going and seeing your progress on some sort of habit tracker, or simply knowing that you’ve never missed a day of push-ups since you started can be a great catalyst to both starting and keeping going with any goal.
What to be aware of?
Once you break the cycle, it’s very easy to make excuses that you’re useless and give up. How many diets have been torpedoed because of one lapse in determination (eg. that slice of chocolate cake for your nephew’s birthday) and then the negative self-talk kicks in about how you can’t be trusted to keep your word. Accept you aren’t perfect and jump right back onto the wagon.
4. Minimum Effective Dose
Pharmacologists and health experts spend millions on finding the Minimum Effective Dose (M.E.D.). Very simply, the M.E.D. is the lowest concentration of a dose that produces a biological response. However, this idea has been taken on by many other sectors. Tim Ferriss uses the concept in his book, the Four-Hour body, as does John Lamerton in his book, Evergreen Assets.
Both authors use the analogy of boiling water. Once water is heated up to 100◦C, applying more heat does not make the water more boiled. That’s MED!
So what is your MED for the task? What is the smallest action you could take to get the job done? Revising for an exam could take you 1000 hours before you knew everything. But focusing on the MED allows you to strip away the fluff and apply your effort efficiently and effectively.
Why does it work?
Thinking about the most effective next step is an excellent way to focus you time and effort. Being creative or busy sound good in theory, but how much ‘output bang’ are you actually getting for your ‘effort buck’? Choosing the right actions that will give you the biggest wins is always going to be more efficient than blindly stumbling through the task, full of busy-ness but not actually getting anything done.
What to be aware of?
Be careful that the actions you take actually produce the outcomes you want. It is easy to look at this as a corner cutting exercise rather than one of efficiency.
You are not looking for the easy way out – you are looking for the easiest and most efficient way to complete your next few steps.
5. The Four Levels of Commitment
This technique relies on a little preparation but once set up, can be used to help daily progress.
Decide on 4 levels of commitment.
Level 1: The absolute minimum you can do to make some progress
Level 2: A small amount of effort you could put in to make progress
Level 3: An average amount of effort most people would put in to make expected progress
Level 4: The most productive you could ever be to make progress
Let’s take an example of your life-long wish to become an author. You have a killer idea (literally) for a murder mystery. The characters are rounded and fully fleshed out and the reader is taken on a roller coaster of emotions with twists and shocks littered throughout the plot. You just need to get on writing it. What could your 4 level of commitment be?
Level 1: write one word each day
Level 2: write 1 paragraph each day
Level 3: write 300-500 edited words each day
Level 4: write a whole chapter (either written or edited) each day
Now you commit to at least Level 1 every single day. Some days, you may only write 1 word and that’s OK! Other days, you’re channelling Ruth Rendell’s muse and end up bashing out a chapter and edit it before dinner. Result! Most days, you’ll reach level 2 or 3. But at least you are making progress and that’s all that matters!
Why this works?
Often it is no more effort in writing one word that it is writing two. And now you’ve written 2, you might as well finish the sentence. And before you know it, you’ve reached level 2 without really trying. You’ve tricked your brain into taking action. Sneaky!
What to be aware of?
Make this easy for yourself. If you have to put away all your writing things away every evening and it takes you 15 minutes to get your stuff out, then you’re less likely to reach level 1 or 2. You then don’t get the benefit of tricking your brain into doing more.
It’s the same for any next steps. If you want to go to the gym, keep your kit in the car. If you are wanting to learn French verbs, have a CD in the car for the journey to work. Craft your environment to fit your needs and make everything as easy as possible to reach your goals.
6. Massive Effort
This clever but slightly frightening idea is taken from Michael Neill. Use a massive amount of effort. Block out a whole week of your holiday or working week to concentrate solely on your task. If you are exercising, hire a personal coach who will absolutely beast your saggy buns all week at a self-imposed boot camp. If you are learning a language, go and live in that country for 6 months. Scary? You bet’cha! But when you commit to massive change, results come far more quickly than using the small steps approach. You cannot fail to make progress.
Why this works?
Doing this makes you realise that tiny little next steps, fitted in between doing the shopping and your weekly bridge night, only chip away at any goal. It will take decades of busting your sweet booty to learn Rimsky-Korsakov’s ‘Flight of the Bumblebee’ on the French horn is you only do 5 minutes practice a week.
What to be aware of?
This technique is obviously not for the feint-hearted. If you suddenly tell your spouse and kids you are all moving to Chile to learn how to make Patagonian worry dolls, they may look at you slightly askance – at first.
7. Get an accountability Buddy
So, who doesn’t love a bit of public shaming! We all do! Admit it. Or why else are Big Brother and I’m a Celeb so popular?
But we can use this idea to our advantage.
Tell a patient friend or family member, who will hold you accountable, about your goal and ask them to check in with you every day at, say, 8pm. Here you can gloat about how you smashed whatever you targets were that day. But just knowing that your phone WILL be ringing at 8:00 adds a little something to your commitment and encourages us not to let them down.
Another way of doing this is to share the role of accountability partner. Find an activity that both of you want to take up: an early morning jog, speaking Dutch, starting a business. Sharing the journey is often more fulfilling than going solo and even if you don’t go into partnership, the fact that there’s someone experiencing similar challenges means you can pool your knowledge and problem solve together!
Better still, put your money where your mouth is. You can agree to give some (or lots) of your hard earned time/cash to a cause that you are not that keen on (or if you are brave, fundamentally oppose) every time you fail to meet your targets. There are even online apps that do this for you. Use whatever leverage helps to meet those elusive targets!
8. Bonus strategy: Double checking our North Star
Sometimes when we suffer from procrastination or problems getting started, it’s a sign that our hearts aren’t really in it. Perhaps this goal is the wrong one for you?
Is this goal really one you are committed to or are you going through the motions just because you think it’s the right thing to do? Could it be a goal you have taken on board due to peer pressure? Or perhaps social pressure weighs heavy on you like a thick, fur coat?
This might be a good time to reassess how you feel about this millstone round your neck and whether you, and all those around you, would be happier if you just cut it loose?
If you find that this North Star is one that is worth shooting for, perhaps asking for help would make the process easier? Look for someone who has experienced the same issues and glean any tips they are willing to share about how they overcame them.
Conclusion
It is worth bearing in mind that our motivation and eagerness to carry out actions waxes and wanes like the moon. Perhaps taking some time away from this task will allow you rekindle your enthusiasm? Set yourself a time limit and take a physical and mental break.
Finally, procrastination can be a sign of poor mental health. Anxiety, low self-esteem and depression are all linked to procrastination due to diminished levels of self-control. If you feel as if you could be affected by low mood, always seek professional advice and speak to your GP.
Procrastination is usually a mental block we have when feeling overwhelmed and underprepared. Use any or all of the techniques above to help you inch forward on your goals and remember:
Always find the Next Few Steps
Homework
Which of the 7 hints above can help you with your Next Few Steps?
Decide which one chimes with you and apply it to your procrastination within 24 hours. Remember: active beats passive every time.
What aspects of your life are the ones that cause you to procrastinate? What are some of your own procrastination-busting hacks? Share them with us below!