By: Dr. Sanjay Kumar Agarwal, Sr. Associate Editor, ICN Group
(In the past article, we know about ‘Procrastination’. Today, we will know about the factors behind procrastination.)
Factors behind procrastination
NOIDA: I used to write a to-do list every weekend with good intentions to follow for full week, but alas! By Tuesday or latest by Wednesday, my to-do list used to be shattered, until I started understanding the mechanics behind procrastination. I started to search for the reasons, why people procrastinate and why I used to procrastinate.
I found that most of the time, procrastination occurs due to our internal tendencies developed over a period of time to delay the things, which are bound to manifest in different situations. For overcoming procrastination, you have to direct your considerable energy to focus upon changing your attitude towards assigning priorities to the tasks.
In real world, procrastination is not optional. We tend to procrastinate for one reason or other. The procrastinator does not know, how not to procrastinate. There may be different causes for you to procrastinate on a particular task. Over a period of time, research scholars have identified various factors causing procrastination. The good news is that once you understand the root cause of procrastination, I can provide you with a time tested, easy to follow, strategies to overcome your procrastinating tendency in that particular area of life. But first of all, you have to recognise that you are procrastinating in any particular area of life. After recognising, you have to make sure that you re-arrange your priorities according to important – urgent analysis. If you just put off the unimportant task for doing some important task, it is not really procrastination. It is an example of creative procrastination by way of correct prioritisation.
For a week, maintain an activity log so that you may know, how much time in a day you spend on unimportant things, not taking you to your goals or at the things, which are not really contributing to your success in life. These activities may include reading useless emails, excessive use of social media, gossips, making tea/ coffee, ironing your clothes yourself, etc. Imagine, when you need one hour for morning walk or exercise or meditation, you always think that you have less time and procrastinate. If you are making such type of activity log for the first time, one thing I can guarantee is that you are going to be shocked to see the quantum of time you waste daily.
Now let us see the various factors behind our procrastinating attitude and possible strategies to use GOPTA to overcome our procrastinating habits.
The task appears unpleasant:-
You must have observed that you tend to procrastinate to do the works, which you dislike or feel unpleasant. These areas may include difficult school projects, activities relating to any difficult project at your workplace, exercising, morning walk, miscellaneous chores at home etc.
Here it is important to check your belief system first. You have to deeply introspect whether you are procrastinating due to unpleasantness of the work or in the back of your mind, you have accorded low importance to this work. At times, you will find even a combination of both. Stop reading right now and do some introspection of your procrastinating habits. Imagine a work, on which you procrastinate most of the time or any particular work, on which you are procrastinating right now. Now find out the reason of your procrastination – whether it is unpleasantness of the task or you have actually accorded low priority to it.
Once you find your answer about this real-life situation, ask yourself what are the negative consequences of procrastinating in this particular task or area of life. Suppose you are procrastinating on starting morning walk. Identify the possible health hazards of not starting morning walk or doing regular exercises. Then think about the possible health benefits, if you actually start the morning walk and regular exercise. Similarly, suppose you are procrastinating on any work, think about the negative consequences of not meeting the deadlines and think about the possible benefits if your honour the deadlines. Once you start training your brain to weigh the pros & cons of doing or avoiding some activity or work, gradually your brain will be trained to correctly prioritise the works and you will start taking action at the appropriate time.
Identify your internal excuses for postponing this particular activity. The most popular excuses are that you have no time for this activity or when you do ABCD analysis in your daily list, it always comes in ‘D’ priority and by the end of the day, you are never able to finish even ‘B’ priority works.
It would be a good idea to reverse this pattern of thinking. Develop the habit of doing difficult and unpleasant tasks first in the morning. When you will finish your most dreaded task first, it will give you so much satisfaction that you will be better placed in finishing other tasks in your to-do list at better pace in the remaining time.
(In the next article, I will share about the strategies to overcome procrastination. I believe that you are enjoying the journey towards the future of your dreams with me. If yes, please stay tuned. Happy G.O.P.T.A.)
Dr. Sanjay Kumar Agarwal, Creator & copyright holder of the concept G.O.P.T.A.© is an Author, Certified NLP Lifestyle Trainer, Strategic Interventionist, Corporate Trainer & Motivational Speaker ( http://bit.ly/Signature-Workshops-Sanjay-Kumar-Agarwal ) and recipient of Honorary Doctorate of Excellence (Management) by prestigious Young Scientist University, California, USA. He is Founder of ‘International GOPTA NLP Academy’ and is popularly known among his fans & followers across the globe as ‘Time and Goal Guru’.
