STEEMING COMMUNITY CONTEST |"MY WAYS TO AVOID PROCRASTINATION"

Hello everyone. Thanks to the organizers of this contest. I think this is a great choice of contest topic. Procrastination is one issue that I am particularly interested in discussing because I have dined and wine with it. It has somewhat provided comfort for me, and seemed to ease the burden I bring, but not without dire consequences.

INTRODUCTION

According to Wikipedia, procrastination is defined as the action of unnecessarily and voluntarily delaying or postponing something despite knowing that there will be negative consequences for doing so. >Procrastination is the most common manifestation of resistance because it is the easiest to rationalize. _ Steven Pressfield

It is easier to say “I am going to start the business next month” than to say “I am not going to start the business at all”. In this case, both statements may imply “I am never going to start it at all”, depending on the reason for one taking such a decision.

FIVE, AMONG MANY OTHER REASONS I MUST AVOID PROCRASTINATION

Lowered self-esteem
Career setbacks
Fatigue
Making poor decisions
Increased interpersonal relationship issues

1. Lowered self-esteem:

   
   When one tends to procrastinate, it rubs off on their personality after a while. Procrastination often causes underperformance, which in turn activates feelings of worthlessness and self-doubt. The sad reality here is that most times the individual does not cease the habit because of these feelings, but rather goes deeper into procrastination. Sometimes it cannot be known for sure, whether procrastination is responsible for self-esteem or the other way round until proper diagnosis is done.

2. Career setbacks:

   
   In this area, procrastination sure knows how to ruin its victim. Chronic procrastination keeps individuals from realizing their full professional potential, both delaying and derailing career progress. This invariably affects one’s income status. Procrastination sparks off a chain of reactions of subtly occurring negative outcomes.

3. Fatigue:

   
   Inability to begin a task on time will see one exerting much energy during the final hours to get the work done. Sleep deprivation and rushing to keep up with deadlines lead to both physical and mental exhaustion.

4. Making poor decisions:

   
   Poor decision-making is one of the worst effects of procrastination. When you procrastinate, you make decisions based on criteria that most likely wouldn’t be there if you didn’t procrastinate, like pressure to finally decide because time is running out. link

5. Increased interpersonal relationship issues:

   
   Procrastination can lead to issues in relationships with coworkers if always fail to deliver your part of the job on time. It could affect your relationship with your team. Procrastination can lead to issues in relationships with friends for instance if you always postpone reading your part of a book in your reading group. This would eventually affect your reputation among friends and cause them to avoid you. Procrastination can lead to issues with romantic partners if you always postpone taking care of your partner’s needs.

SOME PERSONAL EXPERIENCE WITH PROCRASTINATION, THEIR POSSIBLE UNDERLYING FACTORS, AND WAYS I HANDLED THEM

PERFECTIONISM:
Perfectionism is one of the traits that make one prone to procrastination. Perfectionism per se is not a negative trait but becomes a problem when one has to unnecessarily delay things because they are overly worried about their work not being flawless. When I was to write my final year project, I wanted it to be flawless. I kept on procrastinating to write, hoping to get a lot of reference materials before beginning. When I saw others’ work, I felt like it was not good enough. This made to keep on procrastinating the decision to start writing mine. I started late and had to rush the project, seeing I had little time to deadline. My performance on the project was affected because of my perfection-driven procrastination
Also, being an IT personnel, I decided to go into freelancing. I signed up to indeed.com, but I never took a job. Why? I procrastinated because I wanted to be very perfect on the skill I claimed to offer. As I began to take more advanced classes on the excel VBA, I discovered that there is a lot more to know about this skill. I am very good at excel, but I decided to go into excel VBA – the programming language that is used to develop programs within excel. I have discovered that it is going to take some time to learn excel VBA perfectly, therefore if accepting tasks on indeed.com is dependent on my expertise with excel VBA, I may never get to accept available offers, thus denying myself the rewards involved. I have realized that I can be learning excel VBA while accepting offers centered on excel without VBAs.

REWARDS THAT ARE FAR IN THE FUTURE OR PERCEIVED DIFFICULTY IN ACHIEVING TASK:
I decided to pursue a career in cybersecurity. I loved the niche but would always procrastinate taking action to learn what was necessary for the profession. Why? In this case, there is more than one underlying cause for procrastinating. The first one is because I feel like the reward for choosing cyber sec as a career option is far in the future. After all, one needs to learn a lot before becoming proficient as cybersecurity personnel. Now, something which I discovered is a monster that hides behind this cause of procrastination is the failure to answer the question “What”, “How” and “Why” I have chosen to do the profession. Answering the “Why” and “how” gives me the grit to achieve what is set before me. Though I knew what I wanted to do, I vaguely knew why I wanted to do it, and how I intend to make out the best from it. This made me always procrastinate on taking lessons I ought to take. Until I was able to properly answer this question, I continued to see cybersecurity as a distant rewarding niche. Perceived difficulty in achieving a task is another reason I would procrastinate actions necessary to learn cyber sec. I loved the profession but somewhere in my mind, I thought it was too difficult. Because this particular thought was salient, I could not readily identify it as one of the reasons I was procrastinating to do what I was supposed to do. I eventually got the courage to confront this factor. I had to put cyber sec in the right perspective in my mind. This is what putting things in the right perspective sounds like “Yes, it is difficult, and that is what makes it even more exciting since I am not someone that loves to do what every other person loves to do. And with proper commitment and drive by listening to people who have gone ahead of me to become pros in the niche, I would be fine, and as time goes on, things will get easier as it was with some other skills I had to learn.”

FEAR AND ANXIETY:
Fear and procrastination are allies. They scratch each other’s back. When someone is fearful of achieving a task, they procrastinate it; on the other hand, procrastinating an action only magnifies fear. When I was in the University, I would often avoid presentation classes, where students would come before the class and discuss topics of interest. I would tell myself that it was not much of a big deal doing it, therefore I was going to start either the next semester or the next year. As I kept on procrastinating this particular action, the fear to speak before the class was being magnified, in turn causing me to procrastinate even further on the issue. I would miss scores that were accrued to some presentations because of fear. I felt I could always make up for exams. Not the best advice to give to anyone. Fortunately for me, I was sniffed out of the hole of fear-aided procrastination when a lecturer decided that about 30% of the overall total score of the course would go to a presentation. I could not risk it because his marking scheme is strict. I had to come out to do the presentation. It was not the best of presentations but I realized I hadn’t done so bad. I expected the reaction of others towards me to be of a negative light, but rather it seemed as usual, if not better. I realized there was no need to keep procrastinating on this matter. It was just unrealistic fear. I would advise anyone who is in the habit of procrastinating because of fear to take action. It can’t be any worse. Plan before taking action. Embrace the outcome and try to get better. That way the fear gradually dies, hence giving little or no room for procrastination.

ABSTRACT GOALS:
When you make abstract plans or goals on serious issues, you are bound to procrastinate. For example, somebody might say in six months, I would be fit. And that’s all; No specific schedule on how that person tends to achieve such. What is likely to happen here is that after you have visited the gym for one or two weeks, you would begin to procrastinate the following weeks for different possible reasons. The reason being that the individual failed to make any specific schedule that they will be compelled to stick to. What made me stick to working out for the past four-five years is the strict schedule I laid down for working out. No matter how tight my workload for the day maybe, I know to respond when gym time calls. You could write down your schedule in a book, where you write the days and hours you are going to be involved in different tasks. Stick to it, and even if you fault on some occasions, do not abandon the schedule you prepared. Reward yourself for sticking to it. Another technique for dealing with procrastination at this level is by associating it with something very important that you know you must do. Someone can say I will not look at my phone until I am done writing the article; Just saying.

UNREALISTIC GOALS:
I had the habit of setting unrealistic goals, and this would often cause me to procrastinate. I had deadlines that were disproportionate to the time given to complete the task depending on its nature. One of the reasons my goals were unrealistic was because my view of time was very twisted. I thought I had a lot of time to achieve all I had to. I thought 24 hours a day meant I have 24 hours to achieve a task. This would often affect my ability to complete a task before me because I would always procrastinate, thinking I had enough time. I only came to the proper realization of the actual time I have to complete a task when the deadline to the completion starts getting close. My new perspective of time was what changed things for me. For instance, if I have a task that should take me one week (168 hours) to complete, I come to understand that I don’t have one week as it seems because after subtracting hours that should go to other activities throughout the week, I may be left with just 35 hours to complete the task. By so doing I am in full control of my time and am less likely to be taken unawares, thus avoiding the temptation to procrastinate.

CONCLUSION

There are other likely causes of procrastination such as low self-efficacy, task aversion, a perceived lack of self-control, impulsiveness, a disconnect from the future, etc. Whatsoever may be the reason for procrastinating, identifying the reason for such procrastination is the first step to combatting it. The cause may lie within one’s subconscious self and may require introspection into one’s personality to unveil these underlying causes.

I invite @richben #alexanderpeace #gormogon to take part in the contest.