The Onion of Procrastination

I'm still observering myself procrastinating on a daily basis, so I haven't yet solved my procrastination problems. I'm noticing progress but I'm not done.

It's like an onion in that there are many, many layers. I keep figuring out one thing after another. I think, "I know, my problem is that my tasks aren't clearly defined!" So I work on defining my tasks more clearly, and that helps a little, but I still procrastinate. Then I realize, "My problem is that I have a lot of fears about doing my work." So I work on overcoming my fears, and that helps a little, but I still procrastinate.

I'm learning that I have many reasons and methods for procrastinating. Recognizing just one of them isn't going to solve the whole multi-layered problem. Here are some of the reasons and solutions I have found so far:

1. I procrastinate when I don't know what I'm supposed to do. Solution: Work on defining my tasks better.
2. I procrastinate when I'm afraid I won't do a good enough job. Solution: Recognize that I'll do a better job if I do something than if I do nothing, and even if I don't do as good a job as I wish, that's not the end of the world. Therefore, I don't have to be afraid.
3. I procrastinate when I see procrastination as inevitable. Solution: Visualize my life without procrastination -- what would it feel like to get to the end of every day without procrastinating? How would my life be in that case? By imagining that successful outcome, I can more easily achieve it.
4. I procrastinate when I feel like it is impossible to do everything I need to do in the time I have. Solution: Recognize that I have scheduled too much for myself and cut back on the amount I have schedule so that it is reasonable rather than overwhelming.
5. I procrastinate by doing something that feels good but isn't what I want to be doing. Solution: Think about all the bad aspect of the activity I use to procrastinate (such as playing online games or surfing the web). While doing those activities, think negative thoughts about the procrastination activities, such as, "This is horrible. I hate this. It's such a drag to play solitaire. I'm never going to win. Even if I win one game, I'll just lose the next one. This isn't worth it. Why should I even try to win at solitaire?" In other words, take all that negative self-talk that happens when I'm doing something I should be doing and shift it over to the thing I shouldn't be doing so that I stop feeling like doing it.
6. I procrastinate in the afternoon much more than in the morning. Solution: Spend time right after lunch going through the mental exercises that help me get through the morning, giving me another mental push to get through the afternoon, rather than trying to continue coasting from what's left over from the morning push. Every night or morning before work, I spend time thinking about how I want to get my work done and avoid procrastinating that day. I usually arrive at work with some level of conviction about getting my work done that day. It lasts most of the morning but then after lunch things start to break down. So I need to regroup and think my good thoughts again so that I can make it through the afternoon.
7. I procrastinate when I think the task will be unpleasant. Solution: Realize that most tasks are ok and not horribly unpleasant, especially if I have the right attitude.

Not only are there many, many aspects to procrastination and many solutions for each aspect, just recognizing the problems and coming up with the solutions won't do any good unless I put them into practice. I can see that regrouping after lunch will help me through the afternoon, but it will only help me if I actually do it. And I have to practice it a lot for it to become a habit and second nature.

Bookkeeping

I need to do some bookkeeping with my procrastination project. And besides, "bookkeeping" is a cool word because of all those double letters in a row.

Today was not a good day. I did a lot of procrastinating today. I did a little of the work I was supposed to do, but I did a lot of procrastinating. So, it wasn't a good day as far as training myself away from procrastinating.

How will tomorrow be better? What can I do to make it better?

I was procrastinating by playing online solitaire.

One thing I noticed is that while I play a mindless computer game, I focus just enough that I stop worrying. It doesn't require so much focus as to be difficult, but it's enough focus to take my mind off my worries. I think that's why it feels so good to play.

Maybe I can try actively worrying when I'm procrastinating. Because my only goal right now is to cure my procrastination habit, I really don't need to worry about anything at all, except when I'm procrastinating I need to worry about that. So, if it starts to be that whenever I procrastinate I manage to fill myself with that bad worry feeling, and then when I'm not procrastinating I don't worry about anything else and just say, "Yay! I'm not procrastinating," then I'll associate a bad feeling with procrastinating and a good feeling with doing whatever it is I'm supposed to be doing at that moment.

I'll try that tomorrow. Every so often, maybe every 15 minutes, I'll ask myself, "Am I doing what I'm supposed to be doing?" If the answer is yes, I'll say, "Yay! I win!" And if the answer is no, I'll say "Oh no! This is a big worry!"

And I'll report back at the end of the day tomorrow.

What did I mean about bookkeeping? I meant keeping track of how I do each day with my anti-procrastination project. I wonder, what is a word for "not procrastinating?" It would be nice to use a word that wasn't in the negative. Maybe "acting accordingly." That's a mouthful. Hmmm. Some other ideas: acting favorably, acting as desired, positive acting, proactivity. I think that's it: proactivity.

Hollow Fears

Usually when I'm procrastinating it is because the thing I have to do is mentally or physically hard. It takes energy and effort and it seems so much easier to sit around instead.

But sometimes the thing I have to do is easy. I know how to do it already, so it doesn't require solving problems or thinking something through, and it doesn't require much physical exertion. But still I hesitate.

Often this means I'm afraid for some reason or another.

As long as I don't examine my fears, they continue to influence my behavior and push me away from doing the task at hand. But sometimes when I recognize that fear is what's keeping me from doing the thing, I can see fairly quickly that my fears are hollow. I prick them with the pin of rationality and they go "pop" like the balloon they are.

I just had this happen. I was procrastinating on checking my work email. It's not hard to check email. I do it all the time, so I don't have to spend mental energy figuring out how to do it, and it isn't physically demanding in any way. It turned out I was afraid of what I might find. But then I realized that I have the capability of handling whatever comes to me on email. Even if it is something I don't like, I can handle it and I don't have to be afraid.

Once I realized I was afraid but it was a hollow fear, I was able to check my email and check that task off my to do list.

Procrastination

My old year's resolution for 2007 is to overcome my procrastination habit. I have a hand-drawn sign on the mirror of my bathroom that looks like this:


So it should be clear to anyone from the outside and me from the inside that my number 1 goal for 2007 is to eliminate procrastination.

But here it is, October 27, 2007 and I still haven't succeeded. Actually, there it was, October 24, 2007 (last Wednesday), and I still hadn't succeeded.

Then I made a realization, and I think it will lead me to succeed at overcoming procrastination.

I was thinking about a principle I've read in a number of places that if you want to change a habit or establish a new habit, you should only try to change one thing at a time. Also, try it for 30 days in a row. (Or 60, or 90, it seems to vary.) But it's pretty important that you only take on one habit at a time.

I've been procrastinating since about 1977, so I think 30 days is not enough. I'm going for all the days left in 2007 to see if I can fulfill my old year's resolution.

From now (actually three days ago) until December 31, 2007, I'm going to try my very best to keep from procrastinating. Also, I'm not going to try to improve myself in any other way. For example, I'm not going to try to eat better, get more exercise, have better posture, floss my teeth every day, keep my house clean, etc. Basically, I'm not going to try to change all those other habits I want to change because it will interfere with my attempts to eliminate procrastination. (I can decide what to do next after my procrastination habit is cured.)

Almost immediately upon making this decision, I noticed something: How do I know if I am procrastinating? The only way is to know what I'm supposed to be doing at any point in time. If I'm doing what I'm supposed to be doing, then I'm not procrastinating. Otherwise, I am procrastinating. Sometimes, I don't have to do anything. Sometimes I need to be resting. Other times I need to be cooking or working or exercising or dealing with bills, etc.

And then I realized that I often don't know what I should be doing at any point in time. It's unclear in my head. So at those times, I should fall back to the activity of figuring out what I should be doing. Then once I have figured that out, I can go back to doing the stuff I should be doing.

Here's the flow chart for overcoming procrastination:

Of course, what about will power? That's where the the single-focus, 66-day trial comes in. If the only thing I have to work on is this one thing -- obeying my "overcoming procrastination" flow chart -- then I probably have enough will power. My mistake in the past (I think) has been to try to do too many things at once: Don't procrastinate, don't eat candy, exercise more and harder, stand up straight, see the good in everyone instead of being critical, keep a tidy house, etc., etc., then I run out of will power really fast. It gets dissipated.

So, for the next 66 days (the remaining days of 2007), I'm going to ask myself periodically throughout each day, "Am I doing what I should be doing right now" and if the answer is "I don't know," I will spend time figuring out what I should be doing, and if the answer is "No," I will start doing what I should be doing, and if the answer is "Yes," I'll say, "Yay!!" and keep doing what I'm doing until I'm done with that and it is time to go on to the next thing.

Of course, things like exercising & organizing my house will be on the to do list from time to time, so I'll need to do them. But I won't try to make myself do them any more or better than I already do. And I won't focus on making myself smarter or nicer or more optimistic or kinder or neater or a better conversationalist or more attractive to the opposite sex or more generous or more organized or more efficient or creative or innovative or any of those all those other good things I could be trying to improve in my life.

Just this one thing for the next 66 days. I think it's going to work!

Reduce, Reuse, Recycle

This one is old, but in honor of Blog Action Day, here are some thoughts about "Reduce, Reuse, Recycle."

It seems that people think about recycling a lot. Frowns come out when there's no recycling bin for the soda cans or copier paper.

But "Reduce" is not so much on peoples' minds. Reducing usage of resources is almost equivalent to saying, "Don't buy stuff." If you can do without it, don't buy it, and that saves resources. Then you don't even have to figure out how to reuse it or recycle it because you don't have it in the first place.

Make do with what you have already.

Make do with less.

Drink tap water instead of soda or bottled water. (No can or bottle to recycle.)

Repair your car or bike, don't get a new one.

It's not very much in line with what seems to keep our economy afloat, but it's better for the environment.

Taken to an extreme, though, it would be best for the environment if we all just sat in the dark and didn't ever do anything or go anywhere. So, I don't think it will go to that extreme.

How far to we have to go for things to be OK? What is OK? No more global warming? No more species going extinct?

Results of First Idea Experiment

I spent some time writing down observations. Some of them I didn't use as starting materials for my idea synthesis reaction, such as:

- It rained this morning.
- My cats are sleeping.

But some of them I did use. These were all observations of my own behavior and feelings. Here's a sampling:

- I like playing computer games.
- It's easy for me to start playing and hard to stop.
- I usually feel like I wasted my time when I play for too long.
- It's hard to stay focused at work.
- I struggle to get myself out the door when it's time to exercise.
- I'm always glad after I get my exercise that I did it.

From those observations, I noticed some patterns. The patterns are:

- Some things are hard to start doing, some things are easy to start doing.
- Some things I'm glad I did, some things I'm not glad I did.

Pretty much all of the actions/tasks/behaviors that are hard to start doing are things that take mental and/or physical energy. They are things that require effort and exertion. Things that are easy to start doing don't require energy. You can do those things while sitting or lying around. You don't have to think hard.

This can all be represented by four quadrants, like this:



Quadrants 1 and 4 generally don't pose problems in people's lives. If something is easy to do, and it's the kind of thing you'll be glad you did, then you just do it and there's no struggle. If something is hard to do, and you don't want to have done that thing, pretty much there's no problem not doing that thing. For example, owning a monkey is difficult and I have no interest in owning a monkey, so there's no challenge for me to keep myself from owning a monkey. A quadrant 1 example is breathing. Breathing is very easy, and I want to have done it. There's no struggle. I just breathe. (Thankfully I don't have asthma and I'm not trying to live under water or on the moon.)

Quadrants 2 and 3 are the problem areas.

An example from quadrant 2 is exercise. I'd like to get more exercise than I do. It's something I'd like to have done: gotten enough exercise every day. But it's hard. It takes effort and energy and sometimes it's painful and it can be too cold or too hot. It takes time. But I feel much better afterwards and I'm glad I did it.

An example from quadrant 3 is web surfing. I love surfing the web. I'm sitting down, I don't have to think hard, I just sit there and click, click, click and look at this and look at that and I'm entertained. Before I know it, I've wasted a few hours reading articles and watching videos that I can't even remember. I don't feel good, and I could have used that time to exercise!

So, how can I tip the scales such that I do more of the things I want to have done and less of the things I'm not happy I did?

Here's an article I read that seems helpful (ok, so maybe I do find some useful things while surfing the web):

Engineer Life: Set Up Habit Changes So It’s Hard to Fail

The basic idea is to make it hard to do the things you don't want to have done and easier to do the things you want to have done. For example, I might require myself to stand up whenever I want to play computer games. Or, I could somehow make it easier or more fun to get out the door to exercise.

I'm not coming up with good ideas at the moment, so maybe it's time to do another idea experiment to see if I can come up with some good solutions.

Ideas Come From Thinking

This sounds really obvious, but ideas come from thinking. Ideas come from observing and thinking. Comparing this to organic chemistry, the observations are the starting materials and the thinking is the heat & stirring and the product is the idea. If you take observations and stir them together with the heat and light of thinking, you will get ideas. They won't always be good, and sometimes your yield will be low, but that's how it is done.

Taking the chemistry analogy a little further, if your starting materials are contaminated (faulty observations), or your glassware isn't clean (clouded thinking, perhaps), or if extra ingredients are accidentally added (assumptions) the results won't be as good.

How do we make good observations? Here are some guesses:
1. Try to observe things. Period.
2. Try to observe with as little interpretation as possible.
3. Be aware of assumptions that can act as their own additional starting materials.

What are the thinking techniques that are equivalent to good lab practices?
1. Start thinking!
2. Be open to various options -- don't just stop with the first idea or conclusion.
3. Draw parallels and make analogies.

I'm going to try to put these theories into practice and report the results in my next post.