I'm a big time procrastinator, and I have been all my life. Changing a habit that has been with you since you learned how to make habits is incredibly difficult, but I'm making progress.
I'm a procrastinator because I know I can get away with it. I've done it a million times before. I know myself and my capabilities well, and if I do happen to leave too much to the end and I don't succeed, I'm exceptionally good at taking the hit, moving on, and not learning a damn thing.
I realized early on that there's no way to change this behavior in one day or even one week. However, I know that making little changes in my routine (and thought process) can become big changes over time.
Procrastination is best friends with stress, anxiety, and ADD. They all hang out together, but I think procrastination is the leader. If I can get get that under control, the rest will become much more manageable.
Procrastinators are "do it later" people. It's laziness and irresponsibility, really; I'm not going to sugar coat it. Something needs to be done, but you ignore it because you know you can do it later, so you use your time to do something less important (usually some kind of distraction you have to justify). Eventually the original thing bothers you enough to where you can't put it off anymore, or you've pushed it as far as you can to your deadline. Then you do everything really quick and feel fatigued and not particularly accomplished because you now have more work ahead of you.
I do this all the time, with everything. The biggest problem with this is that the time spent between deciding to do it later and actually doing it sorta gets wasted. If I happen to choose that as leisure time, I can't really relax because I know I have other things I should be doing. Relaxing never actually happens. All those things I add to my "do it later" list pile up, and then I feel overwhelmed and anxious and unsure if I can get everything done. On top of that, I have trouble sorting my priorities. Often what gets put off are the things that should be done first.
Life skills, man. I'm always late to the party.
I've started making some little changes that are beginning to add up, and I can already see how they're affecting both my mental state and productivity in a positive way. I figured I'd share them here since they've been helpful, and maybe they can help someone else too.
1. I started making the bed every day. Doing this simple task does so much. Also my definition of "make" is loose - our bed is against a wall and we don't really use a comforter, so basically I just fix the sheet so it looks nice. Still, it has a huge effect on how I feel and I'm more productive when I do it early in the day.
2. I organized my stuff. I don't like clutter, and when my space is cluttered I have more trouble focusing and I'm distracted easily. I live life by "everything has a place, and everything in its place" when possible. Over the course of a few days, I cleaned and organized my art stuff, jewelry, and desk area and it has helped SO MUCH.
3. I just flat out decided to stop being a "do it later" person. If I notice something needs to be done, I don't make a mental note about it and file it away (and forget it) like I used to. I just do it. That goes for dishes, general apartment upkeep, replacing paper towel and toilet paper, etc. I figure they can't make my to-do list larger if they never get added to it in the first place!
I'm still working on applying #3 to catching up on my writing, but I've made more progress in the last week than I have in a month. I need a clean slate - it's time to focus!
No comments :
Post a Comment