Are you a victim of laziness, the root cause of procrastination?
Do you often suffer because of what you initially considered as easy has turned difficult?
Have you lost valuable time, an unforeseen further delay?
You may draw comfort from the fact that you are in the company of many that are affected by procrastination.
When these delays are caused by yourself, you have to first recognize that procrastination is a from of laziness and something that must be dealt with in a forceful manner.
Failure to deal with it will lead to you being more and more "easy going" with deadlines until you hardly get anything done.
If followed, the following steps will help you conquer this wrong attitude and help you to develop effective time management.
1. Plan your day.
Draw up a list of must-do activities.
2. Prioritize the activities, recognize that some tasks may appear urgent but are in fact relatively unimportant. Others are really important - so you must put those at the top of the list.
The idea is based on the established principle that 80% of rewards accrue from 20% of effort directed towards accomplishing important work.
So do that important work first.
3. Estimate the time required for each of the listed activities after analyzing their complexity. Avoid underestimation, you still need to do each job to a high standard.
Similarly, avoid overestimation the time required, for that may leave some activities without enough time. A realistic budgeting of time is a must.
Remember that time allocation is a skill that is acquired with experience. So keep reviewing and revising your time schedule as you progress. After a week of keeping on top of your timing schedule, you will be quite skillful at time budgeting.
4. Organize your life. That will help you avoid wasting your precious time and leave more time for the actual work.
Remember indiscipline causes confusion, even chaos, in life. It eats into your time. Avoid sloppiness. For instance, leave your personal belongings of daily use, like your glasses, your clothing, your computer etc., in the same place. If you do, you won’t need to spend time looking for them all over the place.
Apply the principle of doing work first and then taking time for pleasure and relaxation. Reverse the order only when you can see that you have started procrastinating an you need a physical break.
Give yourself a reward for finishing a task - quick break, trip to the coffee machine etc. This reward system will subconsciously train you to complete tasks instead of procrastinating.
5. Start working bit by bit.
You may see a mountain at first, but mountains can be moved, one stone at a time.
Do not be overwhelmed by the immensity of the task before you. That will put you off. And you will put off the task for another day, which will never come. Just begin by taking one small step and you will invariably reach your destination. Think of all the other tasks that you have successfully completed. A journey of a thousand miles starts with a single step!
6. Put first things first early in the day. Remember procrastination grows into a habit by the minute. Begin your day by launching yourself head first into the most important job waiting to be done. Get that finished and tick it off the list!
7. Learn to cope with anxiety, depression, stress and other similar conditions of the mind related to your problems in life. Keep yourself fit, not just physically but mentally as well. Learn and practice suitable mental relaxation techniques such as meditation.
Finally, realize that procrastination is an enemy - so treat it like one. Show determined effort to get tasks done and soon - before you know it - you will have conquered procrastination.
