How to Defeat Procrastination
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One of the things that holds most people back in business and in life is procrastination – putting off things that should be done today and leaving them to do ‘later’. Everybody procrastinates to some extent, so you are not alone. It is those people who can put aside their procrastination and move towards action more quickly that will be the most successful in life and business. A favorite quote of mine is that “life rewards action!” Action, at the proper time, is the opposite of procrastination.
Why does procrastination occur? It occurs when your mind, consciously or sub-consciously, has a view of the ‘pain’ and ‘pleasures’ that can occur from doing, or not doing the task. Each task in life has its own costs (‘pain’) attached completing it, but it has rewards (‘pleasures’) as well. What people often forget, but in truth drives you just as much, is that for every task there are also ‘pains’ of not completing the task, which drives you towards their completion. It is the balance of these varied pains and pleasures that result in one of two things – action or procrastination.
For example, if you are procrastinating and not mowing the lawn that needs to be cut, you view the ‘pain’ of mowing the lawn as more important than the results (‘pleasure’) that would come from having it completed. In other words, the time you give up to do the mowing, the effort you would need to put out and other ‘pains’ that would be involved cover up the satisfaction you would get for completing the task and from having a nicely cut lawn.
But there is another ‘pain’ involved too. Except this ‘pain’ pushes you towards to completing the task. In this case, it would be the pain you feel from looking at your uncut lawn. The pain you perceive from the harm to your reputation you might face amongst your neighbors. The longer your grass gets, the more this ‘pain’ becomes prevalent. The ‘pain’ that prevents you from doing the task is a NEGATIVE ‘pain’. The ‘pain’ pushing you towards doing the task is a POSITIVE ‘pain’.
“The secret of success is learning how to use pain and pleasure instead of having pain and pleasure use you. If you do that, you’re in control of your life. If you don’t, life controls you.” – Tony Robbins
These ‘pains’ and ‘pleasures’ from a given task can change as time goes on, which is why you might suddenly do the task at hand. I see this all the time with my students. If you are a student who has a paper due in a month, there is not as much ‘pleasure’ from doing the task, and there is no positive ‘pain’ pushing you towards doing it – you only have the negative ‘pain’ keeping you from doing it. If however, you now have only one day before the paper is due, there is a new positive ‘pain’ that pushes you towards doing the task. That positive ‘pain’ is of course the risk of getting a failing grade.
If you are in sales you might procrastinate about making a call to a prospect. In this case you view the ‘pain’ of getting out of your comfort zone and facing possibly rejection as being stronger than the pleasure from the results you could get from making the call. The thing about this fact is that usually your mind has it completely wrong. The tendency is to inflate the costs and to lower the true rewards you will receive. That is why FEAR stands for False Expectations Appearing Real – most of them will simply never come true.
So based on this view of ‘pain’ and ‘pleasure’ and their effects of procrastination, how can you force yourself to take action more – to get past procrastination and create results? There are three ways that naturally come out of this understanding:
1. Decrease the perceived negative ‘pain’.
This means using your mind to view the task at hand as having less negative costs. In other words, take a realistic look at the possible outcomes. Chances are you are making it much harder than it really is. You are likely emphasizing negative results that in reality are never going to happen. Take a more realistic look and understand that in most cases what you fear will never happen, that the task is much easier than you are making it out to be, and will take much less time than you are figuring.
2. Increase the ‘pleasure’ from completing the task.
To do this, spend more time focusing on what you will get out of completing the task. Think through all the benefits of completing the task at hand. The better feeling you will gain, the removal of stress, the extra income you will earn, the easier it will make your life etc… That is why goal setting is so important. You need to clearly be able to know why you are pursing the goals you are pursing. What are the results you will get, and why are they important? If you are building a side business, blog, or website, you need to think through the benefits that success will bring to you and your family. Emphasize these positives in your mind. Focus on this, rather than on the ‘negative’ pain.
3. Increase the positive ‘pain’.
In other words, emphasize all the negatives that will occur if you DO NOT do the task at hand. Think through all the potential costs with not doing it. These could include the loss of reputation, the giving up on your goals, and the missing of deadlines. Make these ‘pains’ as large and as important as possible. If you are the salesperson needing to make a prospecting call focus on all the things that could happen if you DON’T make the call. Perhaps the prospect goes with a different product, or goes with the same product but purchases it from someone else. Realize in your mind that your business will not grow if you don’t make the call – you’ll be giving up on your dreams and your goals. Repeat to yourself the saying, “If I don’t act, I lose!” This increased positive ‘pain’ can drive you towards completing the task at hand.
Procrastination is all in the mind. It is how you perceive the ‘pains’ and ‘pleasures’ associated with either doing, or not doing the task at hand. Because the mind is what causes procrastination, you can also use the mind to defeat it. Use the mind to increase the ‘pain’ of not doing tasks, increase the ‘pleasures’ of completing the tasks, and decrease the ‘pain’ associated with doing the task. Do these three things strongly enough and you will be able to get yourself to take action on whatever you need to do.
Written by:
Danny Gamache
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