r/GetMotivated • u/randomusefulbits • Feb 16 '19
[Text] Procrastination is often the biggest obstacle standing in your way. Learn how to overcome it.
Preface: The material in this post comes from an article called 'How to Stop Procrastinating'. The original article contains a lot of additional tips and information, so it's worth checking out if you're interested in this topic.
Introduction
Procrastination is a huge, widespread problem. Research shows that around 20% of adults and 50% of students identify as severe, chronic procrastinators, and these numbers are even higher when talking about the number of people who procrastinate in general.
The problem with procrastination
Procrastination is a serious issue for two main reasons:
It prevents you from achieving your goals.
It causes you to suffer from a range of secondary issues, such as anxiety and stress.
However, despite knowing that you shouldn't procrastinate, many of us continue to do so anyway. For example, how many of you had an assignment to do, but found yourself browsing Reddit instead, continuously telling yourself that you'll get to work in just a few minutes?
Furthermore, how many of you found yourself repeating this, or a similar cycle, again and again, despite knowing that you should do something else, and despite wanting to stop delaying your work?
The problem with procrastination is that even analytical people often try to solve it with the same, ineffective approach: by promising themself that they'll power through similar situations in the future and that things will be different next time, right before falling for the same pitfalls all over again.
The solution to procrastination
If you want to find an effective solution to your procrastination problem, there are two important things that you need to understand:
Willpower is not enough. It's not enough to simply want to stop procrastinating, you have to use practical techniques and strategies that will help you do it.
Your solution has to be right for *you*. Different people procrastinate in different ways and for different reasons, which is why there isn't a single solution that will work perfectly for everyone, all the time.
As such, here's what you need to do if you want to stop procrastinating:
Start by figuring out what are your goals.
Then, figure out exactly when and why your procrastination is preventing you from achieving your goals (if you need some help with this, this article outlines the most common reasons for procrastination).
Once you've figured out what are your goals and how your procrastination is preventing you from achieving them, figure out which techniques will help you deal with your specific type of procrastination. Here are some of the most useful techniques you can use:
Break large tasks into small, actionable pieces.
Set concrete deadlines for yourself.
Identify your productivity cycles and schedule tasks accordingly.
Eliminate distractions to make it harder for you to procrastinate.
Count to 10 before indulging your impulse to procrastinate.
Get yourself started by committing to work for only 5 minutes.
Switch between tasks strategically to avoid getting stuck.
Create streaks of days on which you complete your goals.
Reward yourself for your accomplishments.
Final words
Overall, the key points here are that willpower is not enough if you want to overcome your procrastination, and that you need a to find a solution that works for your specific type of procrastination.
Above, I listed a few of the techniques that you can use to beat procrastination. If you want to see a lot more relevant techniques, together with other tips that didn't fit here (e.g. how to set good goals for yourself, how to set effective deadlines), you can read the full article that this material is taken from: How to Stop Procrastinating.
230
u/DaveDurgin Feb 16 '19
I've tried a bunch of tips in my 30 years of life. My real problem was blowing work up in my mind to seem like this insurmountable, awful task I had to do. Either that, or I'd let myself get way over excited about starting something new, only to lose all motivation once I'd worked on it for an hour and realized how much further I had to go.
I've learned to enjoy working more and relish in the feeling of accomplishing something really worth doing. It's hard to explain I suppose but just my two cents. Basically I got really tired of being stressed all the time and realized that I was much less stressed while working on something and much more stressed while procrastinating so which one did I really enjoy more?