Personal Development for Smart People Forums - View Single Post - Can I learn to stop Procrastinating? I dont think so

osonda · 07-03-2009, 08:44 AM

The articles you mentioned were relatively short and superficial. They are a good start, but they are not the solution to procrastination. It doesn't look like you are doing the problem justice. You need to read entire books on it, you need to change your habits a lot, and you need to reorganize the way you keep your information. It is not going to happen overnight.

Since you have a project on your hands right now, here are a few bits of advice:

- if you had eternity to do this project the way you want to do it, how would the very first five minutes of your work on it be like? Once you know that, do those five minutes of work. Then reward yourself with something you really want to do (I mean meaningful, guilty-free fun, not "emptier" stuff like browsing the web randomly while guiltily worrying about having to get back to work). (The usual block is 30 minutes, but if your case is severe even 5 minutes will help. See Timeboxing.)

- sometimes the first step is not what you would think it should be. It might be that your first five minutes must be spend simply looking up the address of a bookstore where you can buy a book on procrastination tomorrow. You may say you shouldn't do that because you need to work on the project instead. But if you are completely stuck on the project, then the only thing you can do is to work on how to overcome procrastination. That is the first step of your project, and by doing that, you are making progress on it.

- if you are really stuck, writing random ideas on a blank sheet of paper may help you unblock your ideas and get your juices flowing. You can do that for five minutes.

- sometimes we procrastinate because we are trying to force ourselves to do something that deep inside we feel to be impossible. I found myself many times struggling with the idea that I should do some programming assignment in a day. Deep down I knew I wasn't going to do it in a day, so I avoided the pain of starting something certain to fail. Better face up to reality and admit to yourself what can be done or not, and come up with a plan that you know is guaranteed to work, a plan that takes into account all your imperfections, even if that means a compromise from the original, unrealistic plan, or maybe even a plan to cope with the fact that the project cannot or should not be done.

If you can tell us what sort of project this is, I can try giving more specific ideas.

But as I said, half a page of advice won't do it. Read the books.

Good luck!

07-03-2009, 08:44 AM	#16 (permalink)
osonda Junior Member Join Date: Jul 2009 Posts: 10	The articles you mentioned were relatively short and superficial. They are a good start, but they are not the solution to procrastination. It doesn't look like you are doing the problem justice. You need to read entire books on it, you need to change your habits a lot, and you need to reorganize the way you keep your information. It is not going to happen overnight. Since you have a project on your hands right now, here are a few bits of advice: - if you had eternity to do this project the way you want to do it, how would the very first five minutes of your work on it be like? Once you know that, do those five minutes of work. Then reward yourself with something you really want to do (I mean meaningful, guilty-free fun, not "emptier" stuff like browsing the web randomly while guiltily worrying about having to get back to work). (The usual block is 30 minutes, but if your case is severe even 5 minutes will help. See Timeboxing.) - sometimes the first step is not what you would think it should be. It might be that your first five minutes must be spend simply looking up the address of a bookstore where you can buy a book on procrastination tomorrow. You may say you shouldn't do that because you need to work on the project instead. But if you are completely stuck on the project, then the only thing you can do is to work on how to overcome procrastination. That is the first step of your project, and by doing that, you are making progress on it. - if you are really stuck, writing random ideas on a blank sheet of paper may help you unblock your ideas and get your juices flowing. You can do that for five minutes. - sometimes we procrastinate because we are trying to force ourselves to do something that deep inside we feel to be impossible. I found myself many times struggling with the idea that I should do some programming assignment in a day. Deep down I knew I wasn't going to do it in a day, so I avoided the pain of starting something certain to fail. Better face up to reality and admit to yourself what can be done or not, and come up with a plan that you know is guaranteed to work, a plan that takes into account all your imperfections, even if that means a compromise from the original, unrealistic plan, or maybe even a plan to cope with the fact that the project cannot or should not be done. If you can tell us what sort of project this is, I can try giving more specific ideas. But as I said, half a page of advice won't do it. Read the books. Good luck!