How To Beat Procrastination: 17 Strategies To Get Things Done
In this new article you’ll find out how to beat procrastination.
If you have ever found yourself wondering why you haven’t reached the success that you want for yourself, or why your life isn’t how you have imagined it, the problem just might lie in procrastination and putting things off.
In fact, if you’re reading this post, the odds are pretty good that’s the case.
Procrastination, distractions and putting off important tasks are at the root of most people’s lack of success.
At first, when you have made a habit of procrastination, it can seem to be reaching goals and quitting your procrastinating ways is nearly impossible, but the reality is, people overcome it every single day, and you and that I aren’t any different than they’re.
What you need most is some inspiration and a plan of action – these tips are designed to help you eliminate procrastination from your life once and for all.
How To Beat Procrastination:
1. Always Start Your Day With A Few Minutes Of Work
This is specially important if you’re self-employed or work at home. You should all the time start your day by doing work for at least 30 minutes.
Do not fall into the trap of saying “I’ll just be checking my e-mail, social media accounts, and blog for just 10 minutes” because the next thing you know you’ve already wasted 2 hours of your morning just checking e-mails and going through social media and the rest of your day will go down the drain.
If 30 minutes seems a long time try starting with just 10 minutes which is normally enough to get you started and to get the ball rolling and have you focused.
Then gradually increase it to one hour or more.
2. Avoid all Distractions
Distractions are the procrastinator’s best friend. It’s the key to a person getting even less done
Did you know that your will power is a really limited resource? If you start your day resisting temptation you are less likely to resist them throughout the day since you’ve already exhausted your will power.
Avoiding distractions to begin with is the best way to go about beating procrastination.
Let others know that you don’t wish to be disturbed for at least the first hour of your working day.
3. Make Deadlines A Productive Tool
The most common notion about deadlines is that they have a tendency to be stressful and tiresome.
On one hand, this is half true. On the other hand, deadlines can even be harnessed in such a way that it could be used as a tool for enhancing productivity.
It’s easier to fall prey to procrastination without a deadline.
Why? Most people would say I’ll do it later, however they generally end up going beyond their schedule or if not, compromising the quality of work.
However, when all the anxiety is not focused on the deadline itself, more time and creativity will be poured into the start and completion of the tasks.
4. Break Tasks into Smaller More Manageable Pieces
There’s nothing more daunting than taking on an enormous task. However, it really doesn’t matter how big or complex the task is.
The critical aspect is really the way it’s presented. It is quite evident and as a matter of fact, research has shown that the manner of task presentation has critical impacts on the brain and on how a person becomes motivated to take on a task.
Breaking down tasks into more manageable pieces makes it easier for us to finish tasks thus keeping clear of procrastination.
5. Make a List of Consequences
Consequences are amongst the few things that procrastinators hate. It’s the thought of having negative results that make procrastinating less pleasant.
If you’re seeing that you’re already procrastinating, instantly turn your attention to the implications of your delayed actions. This will often stir up pressure.
Although pressure can sometimes break you down but this sort of pressure will help you eliminate the urge to procrastinate.
Just think what happens if you keep delaying that important task – you just finish up going nowhere.
Like the story Alice in Wonderland when asking the way and getting the answer if you don’t know where you’re going any road will get you there.
6. Seek Support from Your Friends and Family
Most of the time, getting over procrastination takes extra effort and quite a lot of helping hands. You’ll need all the help you can get.
Ask your family and friends to monitor your tasks and check if you’re doing them on time. This may be a little annoying at times but when someone is checking in on you, you’re more likely to be productive.
Remember there isn’t any disgrace in asking for help, there aren’t any silly questions only perhaps some foolish answers.
7. Get Yourself Motivated!
There’s nothing that can substitute the driving force of motivation. With the right kind and amount of motivation, even the most logically bent procrastinator can’t resist.
Motivation is the key to achieving any type of goal. This applies to everybody no matter how big or how small your goal may be. Motivate yourself with the things that make you happy (1).
Think of the better life that you could live if only you would expedite rather than procrastinate. Although it’s all easier said than done, it isn’t impossible.
Motivation is occasionally the missing puzzle piece in our lives, it completes us.
8. Learn to Manage Your Time
As we all know Time waits for nobody. It makes sense therefore to take time out to make a To-Do list.
Then train yourself to go down your to do list without skipping the difficult items. Concentrate on one thing at a time. Stop nonproductive activities as soon as possible.
Put up signs reminding you of your goals. Let others around you know not to disturb you for at least an hour while you’re working. Remember Time Flies so don’t waste it!
9. Set some Goals
Your first task in reaching your goal is to set one. That makes sense, right? But it isn’t as easy as writing something down on a piece of paper.
You need to ensure that you have a selected goal, one that has benchmarks and can really be measured.
You may lack motivation because you don’t have a selected Goal to work towards, if that’s the case you’ll easily become discouraged.
Make sure that your Goal(s) are broken right down to smaller ones and then set yourself the task of meeting them so you can see some progress.
If you want to accomplish anything you need to ask yourself whether or not the Goals you have are realistic, then once they’re all you need to do is focus on them one by one.
Remember that anything worthwhile is never accomplished overnight just be patient.
10. Make a Plan
A plan is solely a way for you to get from point A to point B. You wouldn’t think of traveling across an unfamiliar part of the country without a map, would you?
A plan is your map to reaching your destination – the goal that you have set for yourself and certain the bigger that the goal is, the more detailed that your plan will must be.
Plans can be as easy as a goal and an instruction for achieving it, or as complex as a whole list of instructions and times to perform them, but the type of plan that you want to make is one that gives you a path and set of milestones on the way to your plan.
You have already got your end benchmarks, which means that you’ll know when you really arrive at your destination, but just like road signs when traveling along the road, you’ll want milestones along the way that tell you that you’re on your way to achieving your goals, and that you’re on course with whatever timeframe that you have set.
11. Create some New Habits
We are all creatures of Habit not necessarily all good ones.
It is claimed it takes at least twenty-one days for a new habit to become natural and sub-conscious so that we don’t need to keep using just will-power.
12. List down all that You need to do
Take going to the supermarket for example. If you don’t have the list of things to buy it would be difficult to know which items are more important and should be bought.
However, given a list, it is simpler to buy items without the struggle.
- Concentrate on one thing at a time
- Start with the most profitable parts of the project and cut down on the rest if possible. Put up signs reminding you of your goals
- Remember to 80/20 rule and maximize the 20% items and work on ways to minimise the 80% items.
- Fill out and print a To Do List for each day. At the end of the day, compare this list to see what you really did during the day.
13. Be Responsible
Definition:-The state of being responsible, accountable, or answerable, as for a trust, debt, or obligation.
Choose somebody who will serve as your success partner. The individual shouldn’t criticize you if you don’t succeed. By doing this, you are well on your way to overcoming procrastination.
14. Check out Your Environment
Take a minute to ask yourself if you really comfy with your office chair and your lighting.
Again, something that might seem trivial like these two things can have a big impact on your productivity. It makes a difference in how you think, feel, and perform.
You might have been uncomfortable for so long that you don’t even realize it. You owe it to yourself to be as comfy as possible.
Your environment can be one of the reasons why you procrastinate so to stop this habit from taking over your life; you need to fix your environment .
As it can have a direct impact on your productivity. It is therefore essential to look around your environment and working space to determine whether it inspires you or not.
Assess if your surrounding promotes positive or negative feelings and mood.
There are several ways to do this such as getting of clutter and mess on your table or desk, replacing light bulbs with brighter ones and spraying therapeutic and aromatic air until your senses are fully awaken.
15. Get Inspired
When you are inspired by some great purpose, some extraordinary project, all of your thoughts break their bonds;
Your mind transcends limitations, your consciousness expands in every direction and you end up in a new, great and fantastic world.
Dormant forces, faculties and abilities become alive, and you discover yourself to be a greater person by far than you ever dreamed yourself to be.
16. List down some positive words to stay Motivated
Regardless of what the purpose may be, the right words should all the time be chosen and get spoken.
If you are faced with tons of responsibilities and things that you need to accomplish, you possibly feel of delaying things and putting them up for tomorrow.
This is the habit of procrastination and this stops people from being more productive and directed towards their goals.
There are several ways on how to overcome this and get things done and thinking about positive words to get you motivated is one excellent way to beat procrastination.
Think about positive words that trigger you to keep moving on. This doesn’t to be taken in just a snap. You need to deal with your tasks one by one.
It really takes lots of small steps before you can utterly accomplish things. Remember that thinking about positive words yields to positive thinking and excellent results.
Positive words can really change what you think (2) about and these can influence your mood in addition to your decision making.
These can even fuel your enthusiasm and makes you believe that you can do or achieve anything so long as you have real determination and you are willing to put an effort in whatever it’s that you need to do.
17. Reward Yourself – Create some Incentives
Whenever you accomplish things and reach your goal, you must reward yourself for your effort of getting things done.
Many individuals are caught up working continuously and they forget to relax and reward themselves.
If you keep on working on long hours, you might also end up exhausted and wear out and this can trigger procrastination, but if you take even a brief time break, you end up more energized and productive.
Every time you accomplish things and come up with small milestones, you need to go ahead and provide yourself rewards. You don’t really must choose the most costly reward
I want to thank you for taking the time to read my article about how to beat procrastination. I sincerely hope its contents have been a good help to you.
