How to End Procrastination in 5 Steps

One of the significant problems in the path of becoming successful in your career and personal life is procrastination, a habit that causes you to put things off until the last minute. Procrastination can make you miss opportunities, cause stress, and decrease your productivity. Here are 5 essential steps to end procrastination.

1. Make it your decision

The major reason for procrastination is the thought that you “have to” do something. Often when you say that you “have to” do something, it feels as though you are being forced to do it. With this thought of being forced, you will feel a sense of loss of control, that you are not making your own decisions. This is somewhat painful and you will automatically cope by procrastinating, putting off the project until the last minute. So when you eventually do the project, it seems that you are actually choosing to do it. But really it’s because you are almost out of time and have no choice.

If you replace your focus with “want to” you can drastically change your approach in dealing with the project. By saying that you “want to” do something, empowers you with a sense of control. This will make you realize that you are choosing to do something with your own free will. Now it has become your decision it makes the project more acceptable and easier to get started.

2. Focus on what you can do at this instant to get started

Thinking about “finishing” a huge project or an unpleasant task can be very discouraging. This will probably guarantee that you will procrastinate and put it off. To imagine all the steps to completing the task is difficult because there is sometimes no clear way to outline them and can be overwhelming. The solution is to focus on: what you can do at this instant to get started? It has to be a very small and easy part of the task, and does not involve a lot of thinking. A rule of thumb to follow is: if can you do it in less than 2 minutes, then it is part of the task you can do this instant. Sometimes it can be gathering the essential materials or just creating a list. These simple actions will get ball rolling and build the momentum. Once that is created, the easier it is to keep going. Before you know it, you will already be deeply involved into the project and all that is left is to execute the final parts. So what are you waiting for? Just get started!

3. Realize that nobody is perfect

Perfectionism is a major contributor to procrastination. When thinking of a project it is also easy to feel that it has to go flawlessly and that everything has to be “just right” the first time around. However, this can cause major anxiety and pressure. You’ll just stress yourself too much to get started because you want to do such a great job. Since you believe that this project or task must be perfect, you’ll just keep putting it off until you are “ready”. Ultimately, you start running out of time. At this point you start to reason and tell yourself: “I don’t have time to be perfect so I will just do the project and get it over with.” You are now giving yourself an excuse, now the project does not seem to matter if its absolutely perfect and you do it as fast as you can. So, not only have you wasted time procrastinating but now you have decreased the quality of the results. Perfectionism has only held you back.

The solution to this is to realize that nobody is perfect and people make mistakes. You should feel comfortable to start the project and realize that you’ll end up with a rough draft. Now you have the freedom to revise the draft. It will actually increase your quality as you will catch the mistakes made the first time. It’s important to know that the rough (imperfect) draft of a project done today is always better than a project that is delayed and never started at all.

4. Set a time limit

The fourth phase to ending procrastination involves using a little reverse psychology. Sometimes you have a project that does not have a definitive completion date, obviously, this will pose a problem. With out a hard deadline, you are sure to keep putting the project off. To attack this issue, you will have to create a hard deadline for yourself. Its important to note that if you create a deadline that is too far away it will not be effective. You will need to set a deadline that will create a sense of urgency. Essentially, you are creating a last minute situation for yourself. As most procrastinators know, this can be effective in initiating action. So set a hard deadline and create a sense of urgency now!

However, setting your own deadlines is also sometimes setting yourself up for failure. You are still able to manipulate it and can change the deadline as you wish. The most effective way to prevent this is to strongly enforce the deadline. This can be in the form of reward. Give yourself a reward for sticking to that deadline, it can be a weekend out-of town get away or you can let yourself finally buy that cool gadget you want. Whatever reward you choose, its important to strongly enforce your deadline and a reward can properly motivate you to honor your time-limited deadline.

5. Develop Habit

Ending procrastination is not going to happen overnight and will take some time. You will need to build up a clear focus, positive attitude and quick-start process to get yourself positioned to develop a habit. With these elements in place you can then practice to avoid procrastination. Begin with a small task that you have put off and take the first four steps above to re-frame your approach. As you get started on the task, become aware of your new mindset and perspective. Repeat this process with each task or project and eventually you will grow a habit to end procrastination….. finally.

Secrets of Success in 8 words and 3 minutes

Often, when people think about success, they ask the same question: What does it take to become successful?

Although there are numerous ways to achieve success, sometimes it helps to get a simple answer and put things in perspective. Richard St. John does an excellent job of answering this question in his presentation. After about a decade of interviewing about 500 successful people, he was able to extract the key qualities that lead to success and has nicely refined them into 8 words and 3 minutes. Watch the video and read my synopsis after.

To recap, the words St. John used are: Passion, Work, Good, Focus, Push, Serve, Ideas and Persist. I think that these words are great at generally explaining what it takes to be successful and provides a good base to focus on the elements that most successful people share. Here are my thoughts on these words.

1. Passion

I think this is the most important of them all. Doing something that you truly love is very crucial to achieving success. It makes the positive difference in how well you do things, your point of view and your attitude. Can you imagine doing something you really dislike? Think of how that would affect your whole approach to things. Doing something for love will increase your chances of succeeding because your passion will help overcome the obstacles that everyone faces on the path of success. Richard St. John says, “Do it for love, not for money. When you do it for love the money will follow.”

2. Work

Of course, this is a no brainer. However, I have noticed that there so many people in the world who have the attitude and expectation of “getting something for nothing” or wanting to become an overnight success. I think this is evident in massive amounts of money people spend on gambling with lottery tickets and casino games. Hoping to be rich and successful is perfectly alright, but be realistic in your approach and know that hard work will ensure success.

3. Good

Richard St. John also states that becoming good at what you do is another important element to success. Becoming better or even the best at something will differentiate you and set you apart from the next person ( your competition). St. John points out that practice is the key to getting good. However, I would like to take it to another level and say that “perfect practice” is the key. Not only should you practice, but practice with a sense of awareness and discipline. This will encourage good habits that can help you in the long run.

4. Focus

I think focusing yourself to one thing is important for different reasons. Mainly, it will help you get the best return from the amount of time you have spent working on something. Also, being extremely focused can help you achieve your goals more effectively. Without a good focus, people tend to get distracted and stray from successfully completing their goals.

5. Push

This is an element of success that people do not really address. I think to “push” really means to face your fears and insecurities head on. Generally, people get through their fears and insecurities by avoiding it completely. But being able to recognize those fears/insecurities and deal with them accordingly is where you can make a change. To push your self to a level where you might be scared or insecure is where you really initiate a break-through. This initial experience of change is the only way to get started in conquering your fears. It also helps to surround yourself with a good “support group” of people, such as trusted colleagues, friends and family. As Richard St. John states in his presentation “its not always easy to push yourself, that is why they invented mothers”. lol.

6. Serve

Initially St. John talks about how success can be measured by helping others with your talents and skills. However, he continues to say that if you want to be rich then you will have to serve others something of “value”. Of course, people will only pay for something that is valuable to them. You can generate value by creating a product or service that will solve other peoples problems or fulfill their needs.

7. Ideas

Basically, generating ideas is simple task if you carry out these common things: Listen, Observe, Be curious, Ask Questions, Problem Solve and Make Connections. I think that all of these are good and are all significant in uncovering ideas. However, I think the most important is to be effective in problem solving, it will usually be directly connected to the new idea (solution).

8. Persist

Finally, the last word that Richard St. John uses a secret to success is “persist”. I agree completely. Persistence is what separates the successful from the unsuccessful. Usually, people assume that a constant daily motivation is enough and I think that being able to do this is excellent. However, I think that what really sets you apart is the ability to push through the most difficult times that you are faced with. Persistence through failures and external forces (that are out of your control) can be the deciding factor of whether you will be successful.

So that’s pretty much it, Richard St. John’s Secret to Success in 8 words gives a superb insight on the main elements on what makes people successful. Certainly there are other various factors that can build success, but if you ever need a quick recharge, this video clip is very inspiring!

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