Procrastination is a selfish act that turns us into stressed out and unreliable people at work and at home.
I didn’t want to write this blog this morning. I didn’t feel like it. I felt like a hypocrite writing it. But I try to say things in these blogs that need to be said. A lot of the times, I need to hear the words as much as I think other people need to hear them. I had a lot of reasons to put off writing today. None of them were really important reasons. But the voices in my head can overpower my better judgement. The bottom line is those voices come from my self-focused and self-indulgent part of my heart. Those voices guide me away from what I should do and convince me that a little time on social media is not a big deal. Or scrolling through stories on my ESPN app or Apple News is okay. Maybe I’ll wander into the kitchen to see what is in the pantry even though nobody went shopping since I looked in there an hour ago.
Procrastination looks like different things for different people. But the results are almost always the same. When we procrastinate, we not only hurt ourselves, but usually someone else as well. Somebody is waiting for that paperwork. Somebody is waiting for us to respond. Somebody is waiting for us do our chores around the house. While we procrastinate, someone else is waiting.
Procrastination hurts us as well. The workout I thought about this morning, rarely gets done in the afternoon. The paperwork I let pile up all week, almost always creates stressful moments before I head home on Friday. The stuff I left undone on Friday hangs over me throughout the weekend.
Procrastination is a selfish act that turns us into stressed out and unreliable people at work and at home.
There is one surefire cure for procrastination: Just do IT! Whatever IT is! Knock IT out. Be done with IT. Get IT off your list.
Once that thing is done, the rest of your day is gravy. You feel released to focus on the stuff you enjoy doing. Your productivity and your mood improve. The people around you are able to be more productive as well, and therefore they are happier. It is an amazingly simple prescription, but just getting started on the thing that you don’t want to do, feels liberating.
I am experiencing that right now! Trust me! It is now 7:45am and I feel ready to tackle the rest of my day. My first thought when I sat down in front of my computer was not excitement. But with some self-control and some self-discipline I overcame the the temptation to put this off until later.
Again, I want to encourage you to “Do IT now!” You’ll have a better day after IT is done. And you will have exercised a muscle we define as Duty: Taking action based on your assigned tasks and moral obligations.
And each time you make that choice to avoid procrastinating, it will get easier to make that choice again, and again, and again. Over time, you will no longer be a procrastinator, you will be someone who gets stuff done, when they say they will get it done, for the people who are waiting for you to get it done. Another name for that person is a Leader of Character.
Question:
● What have you been putting off that you can start doing now?
● What if you knocked IT out before the hour was done? Or at least started IT?
Here is a quick assessment that will take you 5 minutes to figure it out. Nobody will ever see your results but you.
Warning: If you are not going to be honest with yourself this is a worthless assessment.
To take the assessment use the QR code above or go to www.MYCHARACTERTEST.com