Procrastination

The most pernicious aspect of procrastination is that it can become a habit. We don’t just put off our lives today; we put them off till our deathbed.
– Steven Pressfield

Work is hard. Distractions are plentiful. And time is short.
— Adam Hochschild

Only put off until tomorrow what you are willing to die having left undone.
― Pablo Picasso

Overcoming procrastination is not, I repeat, not about cramming additional work into your day … overcoming procrastination is about simplifying your life to make space for the activities that matter most.
– Richie Norton

Procrastination is defined as the voluntary and unnecessary postponement of important action. It may surprise you to learn that there are many valid reasons for procrastinating, including low self-esteem, lack of interest, feeling overwhelmed, and fear of failure. Distractions like phones and other digital devices are also common perpetrators of procrastination.

But even without distractions, procrastination is detrimental to productivity. The worst part about procrastination is the stress and anxiety it leads to. Especially when you procrastinate over something that has a time limit. It creates worry that whatever it is won’t get done on time, which can cause tension, headaches, and stomach pain.

Another downside to procrastination is that when you wait until the last second to do something, whatever it is will get a rush job. There just isn’t enough time to do it right, so you do a rush job that isn’t quite your best effort.

Unfortunately, procrastination is simply more enjoyable that getting the work done. While we may feel more relaxed while procrastinating, we just cannot work productively this way. What we’re doing is building up a bad, unproductive habit. Continually giving in to the urge to procrastinate makes it harder and harder for us to be highly productive again.

So what can we do to break the procrastination habit?

I’m sure you’ve heard this advice before, but one of the things that helps is to have a milestone, or small target to achieve. Smaller goals can motivate you more that a larger goal, so if you’re facing a large goal, break it down into smaller chunks.

Find a "work and break" rhythm. Set a specific amount of time to work, followed by a specific amount of time for a break. You might need some trial and error to find the rhythm that works for you, but doing so can build your productivity.

Make yourself a schedule to guide you so you know what you should be doing during a specific time in your day. Break your day into time frames to accomplish specific tasks so you know what you should be focusing on, and when.

Use the reward system. Instead of beating yourself up for what you didn’t get done, reward yourself for what you did accomplish. Having a reward to look forward to can help motivate you. On the other hand, if you’ve been unproductive, you can also punish yourself.

There’s also a case to be had for procrastination to be a good thing. When you’ve got a lot of tasks to be done, it can be good to put off some of them to be done later so you can spend more time on the most important one. Sometimes putting off a task gives you more time to think about it and strategize. The increased pressure might create an impetus and create the motivation needed to start working.

Procrastinating can give you more time to think about the task. It gives you the time to seek out other opinions on what you’re doing. It can enhance your creativity – it gives you a breather so you can step back from whatever you’ve been struggling with.

But good or bad, procrastination is one of life’s challenges that we all must face at some time or other.

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WORDAGE REPORT

The Kingston Writersfest is having what they call a Winter Writer’s Retreat. It’s in March, which I think of as spring, not winter, but who cares, it’s another chance to get away to do writerly things. I first heard about it just after Christmas and I’ve been checking their site once a week for details ever since.

Finally, the information on the masterclasses went up this week. Yes! And there are some really interesting workshops being offered. There are a couple focusing on poetry, one on writing dialogue, one on writing rom-coms, just to name a few. So I whipped out my credit card and paid for my four-day pass.

Ironically, the retreat is being held at the hotel I ended up staying at for the fall Writersfest. This time I wasn’t taking any chances and I booked my room right away so that I didn’t miss out on the festival discount. All total, the whole thing cost a little less than just my hotel bill for the fall Writersfest.

Now I can’t wait for March!

NEW WORDS:
1444+814+329+713=3,300
UP – 207 words from last week

Goals For Next Week:
Get all of my blog post up on time.

EDITING:
0 pages
I cannot tell a lie. I didn’t even so much as crack the file open on Elemental Spirit. Or any other file that needs editing.

Goal For Next Week:
Start work on An Elemental Spirit.

MARKETING:
Yeah, nothing new here.

Goal For Next Week:
Set up author page on Amazon; update book page on blog

TECH & TRAINING:
Nothing new here, unless you count fixing the wifi – again! I left the hubby in charge of the granddaughter (who had a P.A. day) and the kittens while I did a couple of errands, and when I came home again there was no internet connection. Even the phone was out. But I retained just enough knowledge from when I used to work tech support to get us back on line again.

Goal For Next Week:
Find external DVD drive so I can use it to install the printer software.

POETRY WEDNESDAY:
I did get a new form and example done last week, but I’m not altogether happy with the poem I wrote as an example. The final verse in particular needs work.

Ironically, I chose that particular form because I thought it would be easy to write the poem for an example because of the repetition. It was not. If anything, it made it a little harder because of the second repetition at the beginning of the last line of each verse.

Goal For Next Week:
Find another new poetry form to share.

CRAFTING:
I fully intended to finish up the craft migration this weekend, but see the above post about procrastination and distraction. With one thing and another, it just didn’t happen.

No work on the afghan, but I did get some sewing done. This was one of those jobs I’ve been putting off for a while – hemming for the father-in-law. Some time before Christmas he sent over four pairs of pajama pants that needed hemming, and then a pair of dress pants he’d been given for Christmas. At least that monkey’s off my back now.

Goal For Next Week:
Work on the afghan – the person it’s for has a birthday coming up. Finish craft migration.

WHAT I’M READING:
Read Carnal Innocence by Nora Roberts. Then took a bit of a break for most of the week in an attempt to make myself do something besides read. Instead, I played more mindless games.

So then I started reading The Hungry Ghosts by Shyam Selvadurai, who ran the “Writing Vivid Characters” workshop at the fall Writersfest.

Goal For Next Week:
Keep up my good writing habits.

GOAL REVIEW:

I almost skipped the Monday post on my other blog because once again there wasn’t much interesting going on. But then I figured even miscellaneous type post would be better than nothing, and then I hit on the idea to share my misadventure making Guinness stew. So a failed experiment saved my bacon (so to speak).

Once again, I did no editing, no marketing. But I still say fixing the wifi counts as something techy. :-)

I did manage to do a new poetry form, even if I’m not completely happy with the poem I created for my example.

While I didn’t get any work done on the afghan, I am a step closer to finishing the craft migration, and I got the bag of hemming finished for the father-in-law. Big “Whew!” on that.

My reading slowed down last week, and I actually picked up something other than Nora Roberts, which is good because I have a whole stack of books in my to-be-read bookcase that were not written by her (and four books that were). And yes, I don’t have a to-be-read stack of books, I have a whole bookcase full. ;-)

I didn’t get back to my lists. Well, I made one list, but it kind of got buried under a pile of stuff and I forgot all about it. This week I’d like to make a new list and actually cross a few things off of it.

Mentally I’m in a better headspace than I’ve been lately, so let’s hope this translates into a more productive week.