Countering Procrastination | Mental Wellness For All

“Putting things off is the biggest waste of life: it snatches away each day as it comes, and denies us the present by promising the future.” — Seneca, On the Shortness of Life

Procrastination is the action (or inaction) of putting off things that we need to do—often until the last minute. We may procrastinate for a variety of reasons; some of the most common causes are:

We are not very interested in, or excited by, the work we must do — or there are other things we would rather be doing.

If you are dreading a project because it bores you or does not seem interesting to you, you might see if there is any way you can put some creativity into the project. How can you make it unique, or transform it into something that is interesting, something that is your own? For example, if you are tasked with writing a paper on a subject that you don’t see any value in or on something you don’t agree with, see if your professor / supervisor would allow you to explain your disagreement or objection in the paper.

If you feel like you are in the wrong career field or on the wrong academic path, this could be something to explore with your therapist. Perhaps changes can be made in your life to increase your satisfaction.
We are paralyzed by anxiety related to a fear of failure, or a fear of not being good enough.
When #2 above is something we consistently experience, and we have very unrealistic or unhealthy expectations, this is known as perfectionism.

With regard to #2 and #3, Research shows that our procrastination worsens when we are hard on ourselves (Murant, Pychyl & Lee, 2015). This is because procrastination is partly an anxiety problem, or an emotional regulation problem. When we are hard on ourselves, we have an increase in negative emotions and an increase in anxiety. So, we end up making our procrastination or perfectionism worse when we are not accepting and forgiving of our mistakes and failures.

The anxiety component of procrastination is usually tied to a fear of failure or a fear of not being good enough. This type of thinking is often tied to certain thinking errors and irrational or self-defeating beliefs. Look over our page on common thinking errors to see if any of your anxiety is related to these (catastrophizing, dualistic or black-and-white thinking, and negativity bias are common thinking errors that tend to fuel our procrastination).

If you find any thinking errors that you commonly engage in, see if you can challenge or dispute them. What helpful ways of thinking or beliefs might you substitute for these erroneous or self-defeating ones?

Procrastination is often tied to perfectionism. Perfectionism occurs when we have unrealistic standards for ourselves or our performance. This way of thinking paralyzes or impedes expedient action, and it often stems from thought process errors, such as all-or-nothing thinking — the idea that we are either all good or all bad, or that our work is either all good or all bad (see our page on common thinking errors).

Perfectionism may also be related to having expectations in the form of rigid “musts” or “shoulds”. Whenever we say to ourselves “I must do X” or “I should do X”, we have to ask ourselves “According to whom?” Are these expectations or standards of perfection our own, or have we passively absorbed them from others (family, friends, the dominant culture)? If you are merely absorbing these standards it will be important to work on finding your own, more realistic / healthy values and challenging yourself to start living by them. If these are your own standards, it will benefit you to challenge them, and to become more flexible and realistic in the expectations you hold for yourself.

In addition to operating on thinking errors or having rigid expectations for ourselves, there is another aspect to perfectionism — that is, waiting for the perfect time. Sometimes we don’t start projects because we are waiting for the perfect time, the right mood, the perfect conditions, until we know more, until we hone our skills more, etc.

While it can be a good idea to make sure we have done our research, and polished our skills— the perfect time for action will never come. We will never have a perfect set of knowledge, we will never perfect our skills completely, etc. We have to have a reasonable balance here—we need to prepare and time our actions right, but we also need to act.

Additional strategies to combat procrastination (experiment with these, not all of these will be helpful to everyone, but you should be able to find a couple that help you):

Stress management can help with our stress, our anxiety, and our emotional dysregulation. If you can get a handle on your stress, you will be much less likely to procrastinate (see our page on stress management).
Get inertia going by setting very small goals. If your task is writing a lengthy paper set a small goal of just writing your title, or your outline, or finding a few sources of information. A small victory tends to spur on further progress. You will often find that you will just keep going once you get the ball rolling on one of these small steps. Remember: “The journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step.” — Lao Tzu
If you don’t know where to start, just start somewhere. Depending on the circumstances of your project, you could prioritize what needs to be done first (create a rough outline or an action plan), or you could just start with whatever is easiest to get inertia going.

If our task is very large, see if you can split it up into smaller chunks. For example, if we have to build a house it wouldn’t make sense to plan on getting it done in one day. Prioritize what needs to be done first and set goals for each day.
Focus on your process over your outcome. For example, if you need to write a long paper do your best to get in your writing environment / state of mind. Focus on doing everything you need to do to write well, but don’t worry about how it sounds initially. (This strategy works very well is sports, and in other areas of life. Archers and golfers don’t get better by trying harder to hit their mark; they get better by focusing on their form—on how they are shooting / putting. You must learn to be indifferent to the outcome, and focus on your form—that is, how you are going about things.)
Use pre-commitment (aka a Ulysses Pact) to prevent yourself from giving in to temptation from distractions. You might do this by eliminating distractions in your environment. If you are easily distracted by your phone, for example, put it out of sight and shut off notifications while you work. If you have a dedicated working space try to eliminate distractions from that environment.
Develop a routine in your daily life if this helps. Create a list of daily tasks and see if you can adhere to it. Does this increase your efficiency?
Set a timer to increase a sense of urgency. If we have two weeks to accomplish something we may wait until the last minute and doing things last minute increases our stress. Sometimes a person needs that stress to spur them on. You can create the illusion of stress by setting a timer as a deadline. This might also help us split up our work into smaller, more manageable chunks.
Create a counter-habit if you find yourself engaging in certain habits to procrastinate. For example, if you find yourself wanting to scroll on your phone to distract yourself and relieve anxiety, you can exercise your willpower and instead make a prioritized list of what needs to be done.
Use a reward system to incentivize your productivity. For example, you could set a timer for an hour, and if you work for that entire hour you can reward yourself with TV time, a nap, a snack, coffee, a night out, etc.

References:

Murrant, J., Pychyl, T. A., & Lee, J. M. (2015). Self-compassion and procrastination: An investigation of the role of self-compassionate feelings in the experience of procrastination. Self and Identity, 14(6), 634-651.