8 Ways to Beat Procrastination
Photo by PPDigital
We all know what procrastination is. Personally, I’ve been fighting it ever since primary (grade) school. And till today, I’m still not entirely free from its lock, succumbing to it every once so often.
I know that I should not procrastinate. I know I should strive to be conscious about what I do with my time. And I know delaying one thing for any period of time takes out the emotional equivalence of doing it for that duration.
Procrastination is a formidable opponent. It is as smart as you are. There is no ‘one way’ to beat it all the time. You need to arm up many different strategies to beat it in the long run.
This article gives you 8 more ways to beat procrastination with.
1. Keep Two To-Do Lists
There are two types of to-do’s: things you do once and things you need to repeatedly do. Keep separate to-do lists for them.
Personally I use todoist.com for one-time to-do’s and joesgoal.com for repeated todo’s.
2. Do the Toughest Thing First
When you start working on a list, sort them in the order of decreasing difficulty, or simply, put the thing you most don’t want to do first.
This way, you’d get the baddest item off the list and the rest will be a cinch.
3. Align Your Energy
Don’t jump into a task right away. Take a minute plus to meditate and align your energies up on the task.
For me, I’d spend this 68 seconds to visualize the results and emote the feelings of achievement. You’d be amazed how much more focused you’d be with this preparation.
4. Divide and Conquer
Ever tried working on a task for hours only to be distracted and never get back? When doing such a task, I can constantly feel my procrastinating-self nudging at me, trying to persuade me to quit.
My divide-and-conquer strategy is to break my hour into 3 parts of 17 and 3 minute periods. I also call this the (17+3)*3 method.
For the first 17 minutes, I would focus on the task at hand. When that is up, I will take a 3-minute break to make coffee, read a magazine, or surf a website. And when that is up, I’d turn my focus back on the task.
What happens here is your brain is tricked into a routine that satisfies its scattered-ness every time you go into a break. And because of this, it doesn’t really have a chance to dissuade you from the task.
I got to know about this tip from 43folders.com.
5. Separate Planning vs. Doing Times
When you are planning your list, refrain from working on the tasks. And, when you are working on tasks, don’t go back to planning.
When you let yourself slip between planning and doing, you’d lose focus and end up finishing neither.
6. All the Carrots You Can Eat
What can I say, rewards work. Sprinkle your path of high productivity with rewards so you’d keep going.
7. Join a Community
That’s right, you’re not the only one struggling with procrastination out there. Blogs such as Merlin Mann’s 43 Folders, Leo Babauta’s Zen Habits and Nick Cernis’ Put Things Off has tons of articles on procrastination.
8. Appeal to Your Rational Mind
When you put off doing something, you carry the ‘burden’ of doing it all the time that you’re putting it off – if you’ve put off cleaning out your closet for a year, your emotional well-being carries that burden of cleaning it every single one of those 365 days.
Muster your good intentions and every tip you can find on beating procrastination and start beating it today.
Yes, today is the best day to start doing all those things you’ve been putting off.