Procrastinators, get your pompoms. Let's cheer each other on and kick the procrastination habit!

[ProcrastinateNoMore]

Inspired by the thread in AIBU... This is a thread where chronic procrastinators can get together to share tips, hold hands and try to break the habit of a lifetime! We all have our reasons for procrastinating (some conscious, some less so) but this thread is our chance to talk to people who understand the stress and help each other make positive changes.

Useful links from the original thread (thanks to all who shared):

This is the best description of procrastination I've read, written by a chronic procrastinator. This is his attempt to suggest strategies.

This is an excellent website from Carleton University in Canada - the page from the Procrastination Research Group. There is a blog with the key posts - useful for understanding and tackling procrastination. The work on goal focus is quite practical.

This post from BBC suggests apps you may find useful.

It might be useful to say hello and identify the key areas we procrastinate in below. Also think about small steps we can take to change that.

Good luck fellow monkey-minders!

tomorrow I am going to make dentist appointments. I'm writing it here because it's not on a list and I will see it

Lotta I didn't even need to open the link for my brain to recoil in horror.

Re self criticism, there's a word, 'introjection', kinda like the opposite of ' projection', where we put into others things we are feeling ourselves. So, introjection is basically internalising criticisms we may have heard ( or assumed) from others at an early age. Like, stupid, worthless etc. Although no one now is telling us these things, it is now ourselves that are criticising ourselves. It's a hard habit to break, but worth noticing when we are unduly harsh on ourselves and trying to be kinder to ourselves. As an example, one morning the alarm went off and when I switched it off, I knocked it onto the floor. Straight away, my mind went ' stupid girl'. That was my mother's voice from years ago but it was automatic for me to harshly chastise myself that way.

aka and thanks for your honesty! X

AWholeLottaNosy I'm with you there - that is one scary thread. Seriously, I am feeling inadequate and I only glanced at it for 30 seconds

My Top Tip ( haha) would be, use advert breaks to do a little bit of washing up, take stuff out of the room, tidy up a little bit. There's so many ad breaks now you can actually get a lot of stuff done in an hour's TV watching...!

Ooops, maybe I shouldn't have posted the link when I only read the first ten or so posts myself :o I always think I should bookmark them and then come back and read them later as they will no doubt have THE KEY to all organisation and happiness... A bit like the hyperbole and a half post upthread.

Lotta that is very interesting about 'introjection' - I absolutely do that too. I remember seeing my mum get furious at herself when she made small, silly mistakes (e.g. dropping cutlery) and I suspect she got that from her mother. And now I do it too. How can I not pass this on to DC? That's what I'm desperate to avoid

lotta who wrote the book you mentioned - is it Jinny Ditzler or Kelly Exeter? I'm seeing two by that name. Also is it the kind of book that's good to have a hard copy of (for notes, exercises) or would Kindle do?

Procrastinate , no actuality it's a really good,practical thread with great idea on, so thank you for posting it. I re read it now and will go back to it. Ultimately it always comes down to ' just do it', but we all seem to have self limiting beliefs that get in the way of that and aren't going to change overnight. Cos if they were we wouldn't be on this thread as many of us are struggling to do basic tasks. Why that is, is complex. I wish I could just be ' normal' and get on with stuff that, let's face it, needs to be done. I'm finding this thread helpful as a source of inspiration and a place to record my wins and to not feel so alone with my perceived sense of failure at struggling to do things that many people just bite the bullet and do.

Ah, wait a minute, on closer look I'm guessing it's the Jinny Ditzler one. Someone's slagging off the Kelly Exeter one as a 60 page rip off. So only question is hard copy or Kindle?

It was Jinny Ditzler and prob best to get paper copy as there's lots of exercises in it you need to write yourself.

I hope you find it as helpful as I did. If you have a friend to work through the exercises with that can help but if not,it's fine. I was amazed to look over the last year and look at all the things I DID achieve, both big and small. They give some good examples too.

akaTFB
I have the same habit.
This is how I am explaining it to myself - my home for me is place to relax and I find it hard to motivate myself to work at home unless I have to.
No advice on how to change it.

antimatter I'm hoping to write out my routine today, to see if it helps next week. Weekends don't count here as everyone else is about and need organising.

I have just made the dentist appointment! pretty chuffed but at the same time feeling pathetic that that is an achievement. So again the whole 'intorjection' Maybe? Seems I have to beat myself up for everything.

About the introjection and the negative thinking and all that. Has anyone tried the strategy of keeping a diary of positive things? This is a very simple strategy for low self-esteem and something I often do in CBT with clients. But I think it could also help with procrastination because of the underlying self-criticism and fear of failure that seems to often be present with procrastinators.

Because of negative core beliefs, either from critical parents or other difficult events in the past, we are biased towards noticing the negative things about our lives or exaggerating the negative and minimising the positive. Our brains literally actually have an information processing bias as a result, they are wired up to think the same old things.

Deliberately paying attention to good stuff that happens helps to chip away at negative beliefs / low-self esteem. So notice 3 positive things every day and importantly, also identify what it means about you, i.e. what positive qualities you have as a result.

For example, yesterday I :
sent off passport renewal (competent)
sent off mothers day cards (caring, efficient)
sent a friend feedback about her work that she had asked for (supportive)

The things in brackets, the positive personal qualities are important to note down, not just the positive things themselves, because these are the positive qualities that we can start to believe about ourselves, if we find enough evidence. If I start to believe in my own competence, then I might not have the fear about trying to achieve things that makes me procrastinate.
Any thoughts?

majestic my counsellor also had to point out that I have to recognise the positive in my life, because I don't see them as important, because I only see what I struggle to do as important. She compared (something I had told a previous week ) what I had done to help and support my ds with me not getting up to put the pots in the dishwasher. I couldn't see it she had to lay it out in black and white what was the most beneficial to my ds, what his mum is capable of to help him in life, or a mum who can put pots in a dishwasher...... I had to praise myself for what I did for him. It was difficult. But the fact is the two things aren't in the same league. Yet I don't and never have seen the bigger more important things as praise worthy. I just judge myself only on the small stuff.

Majestic, I agree about the brain being pre programmed to see negativity, like the idea of writing down achievements and the quality that demonstrates. It's funny tho, if I think of the example of me finding my electric toothbrush and finally charging it, I could say that demonstrates determination but of course my mind goes, ' but you should have done it months ago..'

V hard to shut the mind up! I also have a tendency to minimise my achievements. Funny as I'm very supportive of others but struggle to treat myself as kindly as I do others.

< sigh >

So I've done something today I've been meaning to do for ages. I've got loads of stuff to donate to charity and today I phoned them up and they're going to come and collect it on Tuesday. Yay me! Just need to get it all organised over the weekend now, that'll keep me busy. So, the quality it demonstrated? Being proactive and determined?

Enjoying your thoughts...

For me it's often so hard to see the positive. Yesterday I got three quite big work assignments done. (Getting started took half a day.) instead of feeling good I fretted about not having finished the fourth Then I went out and got a home thing fixed (has been pending for months) still feeling bad about things I didn't have time to do.

Today a work thing was unexpectedly cancelled. I got some unscheduled time and in a sudden burst of energy totally decluttered my home office, binning a lot of stuff (mountains of paper, a dead printer and an ancient external CD-ROM drive). Then I had a productive rest of the day, not quite finishing but moving ahead anyway. All thanks to this thread!

Well done Lotta - yes it sounds extremely proactive and determined, i'm sure the clearout will go well!

Majestic great idea! A friend keeps a gratitude journal on her phone app. I'm too disorganized for that but I'm trying to take a moment each day when I am fully present in the moment and grateful. I've decided to try to feel good about this week, focusing what I got done and how good it feels, and not brooding over what did not get done.

I love the idea about writing down 3 positive things and identifying what qualities they are. I need to think of best way to store it!

So a really great thing happened today! A bit of background, I'm currently living in my parent's house. My mum died last year, she had been in a nursing home for 4 years after a severe stroke. I moved back here from London to look after my dad who had dementia and was losing his sight. He's now gone into a care home as it proved too difficult for me to look after him and he was a danger to himself. So I'm in the process of sorting out the house. There's loads of stuff that needs to be got rid of. I've done some already but it's hard as there's so much and some stuff I don't know what to do with ( hundreds of classical records for example), plus my older sisters also need to have a say in it and I'm finding it emotionally quite hard to get rid of their stuff. Even though they're gone, it feels disrespectful, even blasphemous to do it, if that makes sense?

So today I've been sorting stuff out to give to the charity who is going to pick it up on Tues. I've put loads of videos in bags and then tackled my mum's books. I emptied a shelf and then found an envelope behind the books. It had £140.00 in cash in it! I have no idea why my mum had hidden money there but what a nice thing to find. I'm going to put it aside and spend it on something nice.

So, what I'm finding by not procrastinating, is that good things start to happen when you do the things you've been putting off...

And... I did a lot of this sorting out during the ad breaks whilst watching Come Dine with Me. I told you you can get lots done in those ad breaks!!

I'm sorry lotta

But well done especially during ad breaks