Even Productivity Specialists Procrastinate
I was supposed to have this blog article completed 2 or 3 years ago. It was going to be my first blog but it took me a year to get a decent draft. Then, I put it to the side and wrote some other things instead of finishing this one.
Here we are years later and I was supposed to have a blog ready for editing last week. I went through some drafts and found this one. “Easy enough,” I thought. “It’s mostly done and should be simple to update and edit.”
And here we are a week after that and I’m finally sitting down to update it. That’s after an hour and a half of doing something that absolutely didn’t need to be done and a day after I promised my content editor that I’d have the delayed article ready.
Why didn't I do it until now? I was procrastinating. Procrastination is having trouble persuading yourself to do the things you should do or would like to do.
I know better. I'm a productivity specialist! But even productivity specialists can't escape the procrastination demon very easily.
Procrastination comes in several forms. I’ve listed them below but since I won’t dive into them here, you can learn more from this Business Insider article.
The person who says, “I work well under pressure”
The person who says, “I am so lazy right now”
The person who says, “I’m so busy”
The person who says, “I just had the best idea!”
If I (with all my specialized training, experience, and productivity expertise) procrastinated so much that it took me 2-3 years to get this blog article done, is there any hope for anyone???
There is hope. Keep reading to find out how to break free.
First, let's examine why I procrastinated.
I find writing hard because I’m not very practiced at it. Sometimes I write a blog article, but most of my writing consists of emails and letters.
Links, pictures, research. It's all so overwhelming.
Do I really WANT anyone to read it? Impostor syndrome at its finest: the belief that people will read this and find out that I'm a fraud.
I don't have anything unique to say. It's all been written or said before and I have nothing to add. Why bother putting in the work when someone else probably said it better?
If I put this post out, it might be a success. Then people will expect more great stuff from me, which will mean more work that I don’t have the capacity for. Fear of success is a real thing!
It'll never be perfect and if I can't do it perfectly, is it really worth doing?
I might do all this work and no one reads it (of course, I haven't yet decided I actually WANT anyone to read it anyway). Here we have the classic fear of failure.
Of course analyzing why I procrastinated won't help me actually get this thing done. The trick is to implement solutions.
Here are the strategies I used to push through the procrastination to get this done.
Utilize accountability. I have a weekly call with my accountability buddy and have to report on progress towards items on my list. I’ve had ‘writing the blog’ on my list often, and having to frequently say that I didn’t do it becomes embarrassing quickly.
Do it scared. Business coach Christy Wright says this ALL THE TIME. If you are comfortable you aren't growing, so do it scared or you won't do it.
Utilize found time. This morning I had an unexpected block of time that became available. Before I could land firmly in the black hole of YouTube (but unfortunately, after I wasted an hour and a half), I left my phone in the other room and sat down to work this out.
Just get started. I bargained with myself that I would work on it for 5 minutes and then grab a coffee. I have permission to stop at any time now that my time is up. Frequently, momentum will keep me going, as it did in this case, and I actually get a ton of work done.
Acceptance. Perfection doesn't exist. Good enough has to be good enough. Don't let perfect be the enemy of good (thanks Gretchen Rubin) .
Courage. Someone will think my blog posts aren’t very good, and they might actually tell me about their negative opinion. But I put out information for an audience that needs my help, and the person who doesn't like my content isn't them. And that's ok. I didn't write this for them. I can't be all things to all people.
Practice. I get better at pushing past procrastination the more I try to fight through it and my writing gets better the more I practice.
Since you are reading this, it means I finally pushed past through the procrastination and published this imperfect blog post.
If you struggle with procrastination, it’s likely due to one of the reasons I listed above, and therefore, one of the strategies I use to push past it will probably be useful to you.
Comment below with what you think is behind your procrastination and what strategies you will try in order to win the battle.
