Procrastination is a human condition.

We all procrastinate. We can dodge, hide, justify with the best of them.

The standard reasons are plentiful and easy to identify. It’s difficult to get started on a task if it’s boring, frustrating, difficult, ambiguous, unstructured. If the process isn’t intrinsically rewarding or lacks personal meaning, we’ll happily find a distraction. Especially if we fear it might not work out.

Of course, procrastination makes no sense. We know procrastinating is short-circuiting our ability to move forward. On a neurological level, procrastination isn’t the slightest bit logical. Our limbic system strong arms our prefrontal cortex. Emotions rule over logic. This lack of self-control feels disappointing.

How can we give the logical side of our brain the upper hand? We can note procrastination triggers, list the cost of not doing a task, schedule task sessions. We can attempt to be very sensible and very rational.

And that’s probably not going to work thanks to emotional intolerance and our own flawed thinking patterns.

What works better? Do something - anything - to get started. Close your eyes and leap. Jump over that initial hump and you’re on your way.

Starting something forces a subconscious reappraisal of any worries and concerns. Original blocks dissolve as we work through the task and the process propels itself to a necessary resolution.

Action becomes its own reward.

References

“How to Stop Procrastinating” Harvard Business Review (2022)

“Task aversiveness and procrastination: a multi-dimensional approach to task aversiveness across stages of personal projects” Personality and Individual Differences (2000)