A major realization for me -
Procrastination is fed by action to alleviate suffering.
It’s very hard to procrastinate by sitting and looking at the work you want to do or are supposed to be doing.
If you’re procrastinating on cleaning the mess up in your garage, it’s almost impossible to do so by standing in your garage just staring at the mess for long periods of time. No, you have to go back inside your home and do something else.
If you’re procrastinating on some work, it’s very hard to do it by staring at the work materials and nothing else. No, you’ll fire up your web browser or make phonecalls or go do something else.
Procrastination is fed by action other than what you want to be doing. If you keep your attention on the action to be taken without moving from it, it’s hard to procrastinate.
But why, then, do we move our attention away?
I think it’s when looking at what needs to be done causes suffering. Observe:
What procrastination looks like -
I want to finish up some writing I’m doing. I reckon it’ll take me 180 minutes.
180 minutes? That’s a pretty precise figure, eh?
Well, that’s one of the nice benefits about tracking my time every single day. Periodically through the day, I write down what I was just doing. This lets me
(1) figure out where my time goes, and,
(2) constantly improves my ability to estimate how long things take to get done.
So yeah, I had about three hours of writing I wanted to get done. Instead, this is what my yesterday looked like -
——————————————-
TIME TRACKING:(Considering day started 6AM)
6:30AM: (20 maintenance, 10 daydreaming)
6:45AM: (15 minutes surfing)
7:45AM: (30 general-life, 20 maintenance, 10 semi-productive)
12:55PM: (120 semi-productive, 10 writing, 30 maintenance, 120 reading, 30 surfing)
1:30PM: (25 writing, 10 maintenance)
2:05PM: (35 relaxing)
2:20PM: Taking a sleep. (15 surfing)
[10:30PM: 8 hours sleep]
11:50PM: (60 surfing, 20 A-task)
1:20AM: (30 general-life, 60 reading)
1:40AM: (10 A-task, 10 surfing)
5:30AM: (210 reading, 20 surfing)
6:30AM: (20 writing, 20 semi-productive, 20 surfing)
MINUTES:
A-task: 30
Exercise: 0
Thinking/planning: 30
Writing: 55
–> Subtotal Excellent: 105Maintenance: 80
Reading: 330
Social: 0
Relaxing: 35
–> Subtotal Good: 445Semi-productive: 150
Daydreaming: 10
General-life: 60
–> Subtotal Okay: 220Surfing/wasting time: 170
Transit/dead time: 0
–> Subtotal Bad: 170
——————————————-
A lot of the stuff in there is good stuff. The reading, good. The general maintenance type stuff, good. The “A-task” stuff is some phonecalls that had to be made, and I re-did the stocks in my IRA for the first time since the crash. (I decided to just not look at it for a couple years after the crash, so as not to do anything stupid)
Funny enough, I’m very sensitive to surfing the internet as a way to procrastinate – and even then, that “surfing” time is mostly pretty good stuff. Reading on marketing, looking at financial statements (but for curiosity’s sake, not practical action-taking sake), fooling myself into thinking I’m doing research, things like that.
No, I became well-aware of my internet surfing time a while back, and I’ve gotten that number way down. But reading is still a way to procrastinate, as is making phonecalls and doing small amounts of work.
After finishing the day and tallying the numbers up, it was fascinating to look at. It would’ve been a good day by most standards, except I’d put off that 3 hours of writing I’d meant to do.
And then the idea crystallizes – Procrastination is fed by action to alleviate suffering.
Looking at the blank page was quite unenjoyable, caused bad feelings. Thus, oh, I need to make a call. Oh, answer some emails. Ah, I’ll read a little for some inspiration. And so on.
That’s what procrastination looks like. Things are unenjoyable, so diving into alternative things to get away from that.
Now, umm, I’m off to go buy some breakfast, because y’know, you can’t write on an empty stomach…
{ 15 comments… read them below or add one }
The irony is that I was reading this instead of doing the work I need to be doing. Somewhere in the universe, a black hole has come into being as a result of my actions.
> Somewhere in the universe, a black hole has come into being as a result of my actions.
Hopefully it doesn’t destroy too much good stuff!
Yeah, I know what you mean. Blogs (or Hacker News) are one of my top go-to procrastinators online.
This sounds very similar to what I’m currently reading: The Now Habit by Neil Fiore. I’m getting a lot out of it. I’m also enjoying your blog. Now, back to work for me.
Thanks for the recommendation – I’ve heard good things about the book before, I’ll probably grab a copy at some point. Cheers.
Perhaps having a blank piece of paper with the things that yiu have to do during the day would help to gain focus.
I do it on my computer in my tracking/MLO files, and yeah it does increase effectiveness definitely. Oftentimes though, it’s not about not knowing what comes next, but not being thrilled to suffer through the difficult parts of it right away.
Sometimes it helps to live in an illusion that you really enjoy so that you think it would be enjoyable to get things done. Music, singing when you work, think on positive things and remember things that makes you laugh. The ideal thing is to do the right things and say the right things at the right time. But sometimes it doesn’t work that way because routine can be boring. Then you need some variation and change. Thinking in different ways might be of use and you may develope new ways to work on. But you can make everything possible if you got passion for it.
> The ideal thing is to do the right things and say the right things at the right time. But sometimes it doesn’t work that way because routine can be boring. Then you need some variation and change. Thinking in different ways might be of use and you may develope new ways to work on.
That’s a good way of putting it Michelle, I hadn’t thought about it like that before. A lot of times when stuck I go work at a cafe or restaurant with a different ambiance – which is kind of like what you suggest here. Good stuff.
Interesting thoughts. I think this is pretty accurate.
It does come down to not wanting to do something. The work may not be interesting. Or is overwhelming or exhausting. Or involves some kind of fear. I guess these feelings all do equate to a small form of mental suffering. That could very well be the common denominator.
Maybe it’s not all bad though.
In college, I’d usually push off long, tedious homework assignments. I’d ignore it until I couldn’t afford to wait any longer. It’d be 11pm and I’d say, ah crap I should probably start that thing.
But while I was procrastinating, I actually got a lot of other tasks done. Things that just weren’t important enough to me yet to address before. Like washing dishes, answering old emails, touching up certain projects. I never did these things when there was nothing to do. Compared to the homework assignment, doing these felt like nothing though. Funny how the brain contrasts things so subjectively.
I try not to do it this way anymore and just do the things I need to do. But it does sort of trick your mind into getting smaller tasks done without much additional suffering.
What do you think about leveraging procrastination?
Good comment, the whole comment here was really good. Agree with all of it and thanks for sharing the stories. Re:
> What do you think about leveraging procrastination?
I think it’s brilliant. Have you read this? Worth reading -
http://www.structuredprocrastination.com/
I like that a lot. Well written, entertaining, and exactly how well it can be leveraged. And the name is pretty cool too.
Thanks for the link!
Great insight. I think for me, the vision of perfection is what really causes procrastination. I have a lot of projects I want to work on but I’d like them to come to their full and complete potential. If I feel too tired or if I’m lacking creative thought at a particular time, I won’t work on these projects, because it means that I wouldn’t put in as much as I could at my best. Why settle for a half-assed version when you can wait another day and put in 100%? It’s really about timing for me.
It’s easy to work on things you don’t really care about. It’s a lot more difficult to gather up the energy required to strive for perfection.
> Great insight. I think for me, the vision of perfection is what really causes procrastination.
Ah, yes, that! Yeah, I’ve pretty much totally given up on that idea – perfection, I mean. I don’t think it’s possible and want to get a passable version of things done ASAP. But I suppose I do delay releasing things unnecessarily sometimes, which means I’ve probably got some of the perfectionism wired in there somewhere still… hmm…
Interesting stuff. Good comment here, worth thinking about more. Cheers Frank.
I love this post! I laughed all the way through it because it’s so true. “Procrastination is fed by action other than what you want to be doing. If you keep your attention on the action to be taken without moving from it, it’s hard to procrastinate.”
I had never thought of that before. So the question now is, do I have the self-discipline to just sit in front of the activity that I am procrastinating about until I either do it or make a conscious decision to not do it.
My work is about helping people learn to lead consciously, so I am on red alert when I am making a default decision rather than a conscious decision.
Normally, as you are implying, I make a default decision — Oh, I’ll do it in just a minute after I throw in a load of wash and check on twitter. Sitting in front of the dreaded task requires a conscious decision — I’m sitting here until the spirit moves me to action or I decide that I really won’t do it this day.
Thanks for the insight and my best laugh of the day.
Hi Jean, glad you liked the post and thanks for the comment.
> I had never thought of that before. So the question now is, do I have the self-discipline to just sit in front of the activity that I am procrastinating about until I either do it or make a conscious decision to not do it.
I think willpower, self-discipline, and establishing good habits all helps with this – but for a short term boost, structuring the environment so there’s nothing else to procrastinate on can also help. That’s more of a bandage than a complete solution, but sometimes bandages are necessary. Best wishes.
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