Here’s a principle you can take straight to the bank: If your to-do list looks good, you will want to work from it. If it’s ugly, you will want to avoid it. To-do lists are like any other tool: there are good ones and bad ones. The good ones are a dream to use, and […]
One of the hardest things for a procrastinator is to tackle long-avoided tasks – ones you’ve balked on so many times that they’ve become a “thing” in your mind. Conquering these tasks is absolutely achievable, even for you, but you do need a system. Here’s how I do it. This method will work for any
The most effective anti-procrastination tool I’ve ever discovered is something I call the Right Now List. It takes a few minutes to learn, about a minute to use once you know it, and can massively cut down on your tendency to put things off. I described it in 3 Secret Weapons and How to Do
Ah, so you will execute your great plans as soon as life becomes a little easier and more spacious than it is now. This is exactly backwards! Forming and achieving aspirations _is_ how life gets easier and more spacious.
Procrastinators aren’t really afraid of effort. In fact, sometimes we put in great effort to avoid a task others would dispatch in a few minutes. What we’re really afraid of is the emotional pain the task might cause: confusion, loss, frustration, humiliation. You might put off a phone call because you’re afraid you won’t know
If you brainstormed some goals you’d like to achieve, you might come up with something like this: Your tastes may differ, but notice that the projects that come to mind when you think about “goals” tend to be major, prolonged efforts. They usually require weeks or months of consistent performance, involving new levels of discipline,
When people subscribe to this site, I ask them what their biggest productivity struggle is, and the most common answer is lack of motivation. The usual assumption about motivation is that you need it in order to act. If you don’t have it, action’s off the table till you find it. In this view, motivation
Degree of difficulty: Easy Benefit: Save potentially hours a day, depending on your habits A simple tool every procrastinator should own is a kitchen timer. It has lots of uses, but one is to force you to move your whole body from one room to another just to turn off its annoying sound. If you
A major reason procrastinators avoid starting big tasks is the fear that they’ll run out of time just when they start getting somewhere. This fear makes big tasks seem like they require big stretches of free time – three, four, or even six free hours — so that you don’t get interrupted right when your
Whatever task you’re trying to do, the hard parts are always the same: starting it and finishing it. The middle 90% of the task is different. It’s much easier, because you usually know what to do next. The last action you took suggests the next one. For example, if you’ve already brainstormed potential topics for
