How to stop procrastinating or postponing a task that ought to be done now, features prominently in the agenda of those keen on achieving success in life. Procrastination can set upon you when you want to start working on your goals or at some point in the process of working on them. Thus, how to stop procrastinating, as a topic, avails you of the means crucial to the realisation of your goals. Negative inertia or inaction can be conquered through the avenues detailed below.
Harnessing the power of positive self-talk primes you for success. To have a serious conversation with yourself helps you to jettison the garb of a procrastinator. For instance, if you are putting off studying, tell yourself that studying is important, that studying to pass the course will improve your professional and official standing, that you can start now despite work and domestic pressures, and that you will devote 8 to 10 every evening for studying. Positive self-talk promotes self-belief.
To visualise your success gives you a powerful mental boost to get started with your goals. By imagining what it would be like to have already reached the goal, you compel yourself to do things now. Your desire for a certain kind of future quickens your eagerness to start now with the goal.
Setting a deadline for getting started keeps you in the right path. By focusing on a starting date, you make a commitment to your self. That commitment often helps you to find the energy to begin.
You begin to redeem your promise to yourself by listing small tasks that can get you started and that takes only a minute or two. With the list, you position yourself to easily engage with the first item on it.
By doing anything connected with the goal, you stand to find your way out of inertia or inaction. For example, you can get started with the task of writing a letter by looking up the addresses or preparing the envelope, first. Executing the simple components of a task, creates a feeling of ease. That feeling motivates you to engage with the major aspects of the task. Thus, creating a feeling of ease around a task helps in answering the question of how to stop procrastinating.
To set up a system of rewards for yourself, prepares you to come off well. Rewarding yourself with something you enjoy when you accomplish one step toward a goal, energises you to continue. A point to note, the reward should not become more important than the task.
Enlisting the support of your family and friends serves a good purpose. By communicating your goals to them, you gain the invigorating advantage of the pride that they feel in your accomplishments. That pride often provides a powerful motivation for you to persevere.
As you work on your goals, you have to understand that plateauing is natural and that you will eventually make progress. When you find yourself on a plateau, when nothing seems to be happening despite your efforts, apply a good measure of persistence. Eventually, your persistence will pave way for another burst of progress.
By seeing failure as a poor result or temporary setback rather than defeat or shame, you render better your chances of success. This idea features well in the topic of how to stop procrastinating. Your perception of failure either motivates or causes you to fear. Fear leads to inaction or procrastination. Holding with the idea of failure as an unwanted result, primes you to learn some valuable lessons. That kind of mindset galvanizes you to forge ahead with your goal.
Jettisoning the fear that success will bring new situations and new responsibilities that you can’t handle, stimulates you to continue moving. Don’t underestimate your abilities. If fear is an obstacle to your goal, tell yourself this: “fear is just a visitor. Although I feel afraid, I am going to do what I planned.” Hence, an update on how to stop procrastinating, covers the topic of escaping the fear of success.
When your priorities and values change, abandon old goals for new relevant ones. Change attends life. So, it is fruitless to stick to goals that are no longer relevant to you. A shift in your inner state and values or a change in your situation calls for flexibility. Flexibility in changing your goals and action plans, to align to your new circumstances, renders your motivation bright. In a fair way, flexibility underlies the study of how to stop procrastinating. When you turn to goals that matter to you, the tendency to procrastinate diminishes.
When you acknowledge that you are human and have faults, you tend to be more relaxed to harness the inner resources for success. That frame of mind gets you to persevere at accomplishing crucial tasks. Perfectionists who believe that they are above mistakes often find themselves bogged down in trying to achieve their goals. They burn up their energy in trying to be strong at all times, being in a hurry always, and berating themselves for not being good enough. Therefore, relaxing to harness your inner resources forms part of the solution that sets at rest the question of how to stop procrastinating.
When you take to hopeful ways of thinking, you tend to set higher goals and commit to attaining them. Having hope is to believe that you have both the will and the way to accomplish your goals. Commitment and self-belief characterise hopeful people. To boost your hopeful feelings, it is helpful for you to seek the help of family and friends in achieving your goals, use positive self-talk and believe that things will get better. Being flexible enough to change your goals and action plans accordingly, and focusing on short-term goals that enable you to reach your long-term goals, also serve the same purpose. In truth, the need to develop a hopeful mindset features well in the topic of how to stop procrastinating.
How to stop procrastinating, as a discipline, delves into visualisation and the need to cultivate flexibility and hope, among others.
