Tuesday, November 10, 2009

How to Conquer Your Procrastination

By: timsgurl

My little 5 year old brother loves to cut paper into teeny tiny little pieces and scatter them all over the floor so it looks like it “snowed.” One time when he did this, he was asked if he knew that he would have to clean it all up. He looked up and said very seriously, “I might not have to.” He was told that yes, he would and he replied, “Well, I might not have to. Jesus might come back first.”

Procrastination. It is something we all struggle with, coming up will all kinds of excuses for not doing a certain task. Even a little 5 year old doesn’t have to be taught to come up with creative excuses to try to get out of things! I want to talk about a few tips on how to overcome those habits

Keep your goals realistic. Realize your limits - you can’t do everything in one day. Set long-term goals, then decide on daily tasks that will help you to reach your long term goals in a reasonable amount of time.

Don’t be a perfectionist. This is probably one of my biggest problems! If I don’t have time to do a task all the way, I won’t even start it. I will mess around, keeping very busy with other little jobs. In the end, I get nothing important done and have huge projects that need done with no time to do them. If you don’t have time to finish something right then, still start it and just get as much done as you can! Then finish it later. (And no, don’t put that last little bit off!)

Make a list and set priorities. Don’t even give yourself the chance to procrastinate on an important project! Sit down and write your list and arrange it in order of priority.

Tackle some of the bigger things on your list first. If you can see some progress, you will feel better about what you have gotten done and you will be more motivated to get even more done! If you are like me and have a short attention span and get sidetracked easily, it may be a good idea for you to set an alarm reminder for laundry, downloads and backups, or whatever projects you are working on that you walk away from and forget.

Reward yourself! After you have reached your goals for the day, take a break and do something fun!

Remember that no matter how well you plan out your day and goals, things will come up that you can’t help. You just have to be honest with yourself on whether this is something you can’t help or if it’s something you are using it as an excuse.

*Article Courtesy of timsgurl. To see more of her work click here.

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