Over
the last few days, I have read a couple of articles on various aspects
of Procrastination and how to deal with it. Then I remembered that I had
read more articles on the subject including the wildly popular article
and TED Talk by Tim Urban as well as the mother of the self help books,
Getting Things Done.
I
thought that in this article I will collate the lessons from all these
books and articles and present a 'Universal Theory of Procrastination'. I
will be referring to the following material in this article.
In part 1, I reviewed the following articles.
All
the material referred in this article are sources from publicly
available material. I have just collated and summarized them in this
blog post.
Why procrastinators procrastinate is the first of a two part article written by Tim Urban. Originally written in 2013, the two articles and the
TED Talk by Tim Urban on Procrastination has attained cult status in any discussion on procrastination. The highlight of the article is its creative and innovative way in which Mr.Urban discusses the emotional topic. He has introduced terms like 'Instant Gratification Monkey (IGM)', 'Dark playground (DP)' and 'Panic Monster (PM)' to explain the idea. While a rational decision maker does what she decides to do, the procrastinator's decision making is clouded by 'Instant Gratification Monkey' that focuses on momentarily gratifying but ultimately useless tasks. The IGM guides the individual away from the important tasks to immediate puerile tasks.
The IGM takes the individual to the Dark Playground (DP) where leisure activities happen when they are not supposed to happen. The air in DP is filled with guilt, anxiety, self-loathing and dread. Sometimes the individual tries to fight back, but end up doing weird unrelated activities which are neither fun nor have any relation to the real task.
The only thing IGM is scared of is the Panic Monster (PM). Normally dormant, this waits till the task can no longer be postponed. Once PM arrives on the scene, the IGM vanishes and the individual is left to fend the panic all by herself. While the individual finishes the task after attack by PM, in rare cases, the individual may run away from the task itself.
Procrastination cannot sustain due to three reasons:
1. It is unpleasant
2. The procrastinator ultimately sells himself short
3. The have-to-dos may happen, but not the want-to-dos (What Steven Covey calls the 'Important but not Urgent' tasks.)
How to beat procrastination? This is covered in the part 2 of the article. The reason why a procrastinator does it is because in his mind he has this belief that 'He will somehow finish the have-to-do tasks, but is not competent enough to finishing the want-to-do tasks'. Unless this belief changes, the individual will not be able to get rid of the bad habit. There are two aspects to this, one is Planning and the other is Doing.
The plan of a procrastinator is hazy, wildly ambitious and do not consider reality. The list may be long and daunting. Many of the tasks in the list may be unpleasant and procrastinator puts them in his list without thinking any details. On the other hand, effective planning sets you up for success. Effective planning deals with selecting one task from a list of many tasks and complete it. Ideally you should choose the activity that will bring the most happiness to you. Ensure to knock out the urgent items quickly before you focus on the important things, the things that matter.
Effective planning turns a daunting task into small manageable steps.
The idea is to take it step by step and consistently move forward.
The final step in effective planning is effective scheduling. Until the task is in your calendar, it will never get done.
Now that we have planned and scheduled, the next step is....
Doing...
He compares starting a task as entering a Critical entrance. Once you enter, you can either go to the Dark Playground to procrastinate or to the 'Dark Woods', where the process of creation and task completion happen. Once the task is completed, you come out of the Dark Woods into the Happy Playground, where you feel happy and satisfied. Sometimes you enter into a state of flow where you complete one important task after another.
So what should a procrastinator do? First thing to do is to get in to the critical entrance. Start the task quickly. However this is where IGM puts its fiercest resistance. Once you enter the Dark woods of doing the actual work, you must resist the temptation of delaying or quitting and going to the dark playground. In Dark Woods, you may also come up with some obstacles that look insurmountable and the temptation to stop and quit is tremendous.
As you make progress on the task, the satisfaction produces its own motivation that propels you over the dark woods. The ensuing increase in self-esteem weakens the IGM.
As you continue working, you will reach a tipping point where the happy playground is in sight. Since IGM is interested only in playing, at the sight of the happy playground, he will become your partner and both you and IGM will move towards the happy playground in unison.
Another thing that could happen at the tipping point is that you become so passionate about the task that you continue with another task after the present one has completed. You enter into a state of flow. Since the monkey is also looking for happiness, in a state of flow both you and IGM work in unison again.
The final problem is that the IGM has a short term memory. It forgets the lessons on tuesday that it learned on Monday. So for procrastinator, everyday is a struggle.
How do you overcome the struggle.
Learn to finish the tasks that you start, the more tasks you finish, the more the confidence will build up inside you that you can finish tasks you start. So your challenge is just getting through the critical entrance. Once inside, you will tame the IGM.
To take control on your tasks, you have to:
1. Internalize the fact that everything we do is a choice.
2. Create methods that will help you tame the monkey.
- Get external support
- Create an artificial panic monster
- Remind yourself to make right choices
- Schedule your tasks. Set an alarm to remind you to start
- Remove distractctions
- Review and modify
3. Aim for slow and steady progress. Change the storyline from 'I procrastinate on every task' to 'Once a week I do a hard task without procrastinating'.
While the
TED Talk by Tim Urban on Procrastination cover the same points discussed in the previous two posts, there was one critical point that stuck me and even shocked me when I heard it. There are some tasks that are very important for you where there is no panic monster. For example, if you are planning to write a book, you can spend years procrastinating on that without any 'Panic Monster' to goad you in to action. For example, for the last five years I have been telling myself that I will start a consulting company on my own, and I am just delaying it year after year. There is no deadline to meet, there is no immediate panic monster to goad me in to action. Mr.Urban says that while you do not feel immediate urgency, a time will come when you will no longer be able to do it even if you wanted to and that time the 'Regret Monster' (words mine) will hit you so hard that you will end up only with guilt and self-loathing and no achievement.
That hit me hard. As soon as I heard this Ted Talk, I started writing the first draft of a book that I have been meaning to write for a long time.
