How to beat Procrastination !!

Photo by BRUNO CERVERA on Unsplash

I think it’s safe to assume that if you are reading this article, then you know what procrastination is and its affecting you in a big enough way that you are looking for solutions :). In this article I would like to talk about my experience with procrastination and how I have managed it or rather managing it. I must confess that I have not been able to solve this problem and there is a lot of room for improvement but nevertheless I have become better over time which is what I would like to share.

Before we discuss further let’s agree on what is Procrastination?

Procrastination for me is not only an act postponing and delaying something but the act of not prioritizing the right stuff. I have been a procrastinator and I don't remember ever when I postponed an activity and did not do anything. For most of the time, I exchanged an important work with some non-trivial task that was not so important but was easy to finish. So, many procrastinators are not lazy people in any way. They just end of up not prioritizing important stuff or delay important stuff. The funny thing is that they "always" know that they are delaying an important task in favor of a non-important one and its a very conscious delay.

So, when we are talking about procrastinators, lets discuss the different types of procrastination.

What are the different types of procrastinators?

From what I have observed, there are three different types of procrastinators which exhibit their own symptoms.  

Class A - You work hard but you always prioritize easier tasks over hard one, rather than important one over less important one. So, you are always working but many times working on the wrong stuff.

Class B - You procrastinate a certain set of tasks which you find difficult. e.g. you work efficiently at office but procrastinate on all the household related work or you procrastinate when it comes to fitness regime.

Class C - You delay every task unless there is no way out and you have to do it. You again look for tasks which gives you short term gratification.

What can you do about it?

As far as I have seen, procrastination cannot be eliminated. Everyone in this world procrastinates, yes everyone. The funny thing that I realized is that successful people don't try to fix procrastination but they manage it. "Manage" is the critical word here.

Let’s discuss all three types of procrastinators and see what are their symptoms are and how they can manage their procrastination.

In order to fix any problem, the first step is to realize the problem, diagnose it and then take steps to fix it. Since you are reading this article, as I called out before, it’s safe to accept that you have diagnosed this as one of your problem, so we can very much skip the first step.

The second step is to recognize what type of procrastinator you are. Let’s discuss them one by one and just for fun let’s start in a reverse order this time :)

Type C: You are screwed. Your majority of the tasks do not complete in time and even if they complete they lack quality. You always under achieve and people less smart then you are ahead of you. Your schedules are also very hectic as most of the time you multitask which adds to your work as now you have to manage timelines which essentially means that you are hardly in control of your life.

Type B: A certain set of people are not happy with you. Your performance varies significantly in different settings. At one place, you might be great while in some other setting you really suck and sometimes people wonder how you have accomplished what you have accomplished. Many people think that you are very lucky and you have more the what you actually deserve. You excel at only few domains while you have the capability to succeed.

Type A: You work very hard but you always underachieve which frustrates you sometimes.  You think you are doing so much of work and of good quality but still you are not getting recognized or achieving what you think you should have. 

Now the most important section, how do you fix procrastination?

As I mentioned before, no one can beat procrastination, at least in my opinion. It’s very difficult and procrastination can probably only be fixed by obsessing over everything and hence it’s probably not even a good direction to pursue. However, procrastination can be managed very well and this what I would recommend. The solution is very simple to start with, you fix or manage small parts of the problem.  In simple words, you need to climb up the ladder of procrastination, one step at a time as shown below. So, if you are Type C, then you try to become Type B and then Type A. If you are Type B then you try to become Type A. This way you make small changes in your life which are comparatively easy. The good thing is that the reward of those changes would be significant to enable a virtuous circle of positive reinforcement and you would climb up the positive ladder of procrastination hopefully very soon as described by the diagram below. The final nirvana state of procrastinators would be what I called as "Prioritized procrastination".

 

 

 

What is Prioritized procrastination?

Prioritized procrastination is an act of delaying only those stuff which does not really matter and the cost of delaying has a minimal impact on your life. As an example, let’s say you want to start a new hobby, reading books. Now reading is a very good thing and over a long period of time it can really help you becoming better. But procrastinating on starting this hobby would not impact the life in a big way unless its a part of your course. You can start this later and be slow and yet see the gains and it does not affect you directly. Another example could be that you want to learn driving. Again, this is a good thing as this would make you self-sufficient but since you can get cabs easily delaying this does not really impact except may be monetarily for the short term if at all that matters to you. This I believe is the nirvana state of Procrastination. You continue to be a procrastinator but you procrastinate only those stuff which does not impact you in really short term and to some extent in long term as well and this is the state which should be pursued. If you really don't have anything find something and procrastinate on it, so that you are good on important stuff just like an e-cigarette :).

How do I climb the ladder of procrastination?

The first general technique is very simple. Find people at a level above you, see how they are better in achieving stuff compared to you and use that as a motivation to change yourself. So, if are Type C, find someone who is Type B with similar caliber as yours. Compare yourself with him/her and you would find that simply by changing the attitude you would be able to accomplish a lot more and even spend less time. This is really applicable for Type B and especially for Type C as Type C procrastinators would continue to struggle over time. I believe it will dawn to you easily that finding a type B and C procrastinator is very easy. In fact, by this time you already know a few folks who are Type B and C.

The second technique is reliving the moment. Our brains have a tendency to forget minor embarrassments and mostly remember good stuff. For any kind of procrastinator this is a problem because you would not remember the problems that you faced while procrastinating and therefore there is no negative memory or reinforcement to help you remember that this is not a good thing. So, this technique involves recording how you felt when you did not do well because of procrastination and compare it with the gratification of the task that you exchanged with. So, next time when you are thinking about delaying a task, replay that video and you would know how exactly you felt and experienced the cost of procrastination and the gratification factor was not that great when you prioritized that non trivial work. If you do this over a period of time and multiple times, it would be enough negative reinforcement for you to not repeat and you would be on the path of managing procrastination.

The third technique is driven via positive reinforcement. Procrastination wins many time because the procrastinator does not see the big picture. This also further perpetuated because of the lack of intermediate milestones. Let me try to explain by an example.  Let’s say you are at level 1 in office and you would like to be level 4 in 5 years. This is what you aspire for and you really want to be there. The first part would be coming up with internal milestones. Let’s say the target could be level 2 in 1 year, then level 3 in 1.5 years and then level 4 finally in 2.5 years. Now since you are at level 1, you should further divide the 1 year goal accomplishments in quarter i.e. what you would achieve every quarter. There are two advantages of dividing the tasks, first is that every task becomes easier because you are solving a sub problem. The other advantage is that you can see yourself as someone who achieved, overachieved or underachieved very easily and also very early in the game and the probability of achieving a task is higher if it is a sub problem. Thus, this could spiral you in the way of positive reinforcement.  This would also help you in tackling tough problems later. As an example, if you have achieved or over achieved 40 out of 50 goals that you set, then you would really like to cross the last mile even though the last 10 problems could be very tough. Thus, a track record of consistent achievement would propel you to work hard and never procrastinate as the cost of failure would be very large. Another example where people procrastinate is a healthy fitness regime. People delay going to gym thinking that they are fit right now but never see the big picture that if they don't exercise they would not be healthy enough to enjoy their life in the future. One by product of this technique is that if you have set very aggressive goals for yourself, you would know that very quickly (marked by consecutive failures) and this technique can also help you in resetting your goals.

So above are the three techniques that have helped me become better. As I said before, I have a lot of progress to make but I think I am on the right path. As it has helped me, I hope it will help you as well.