From Where I Sit

Procrastination had been getting the better of Frank for many months, well years actually. He hadn’t been happy about the way procrastination had taken over his life, but he’d been feeling pretty powerless to regain control. Procrastination made it difficult for Frank to do small things like tidy up his flat, do a load of washing, shop for food, or cook a meal, but it also made it difficult to call friends to go out for dinner, or to look for a more satisfying job, or think about getting the much needed repairs on the car. It touched pretty much all areas of his life.

Frank was very unhappy about the state of affairs and he’d made some efforts to push through procrastination but wasn’t getting anywhere fast. In a perverse twist each time Frank tried to tackle the problem of procrastination, he was struck down by procrastination, robbing him of the energy and motivation needed to overcome the problem. Even when he thought counselling might help it had taken months to get around to making the phone call to book an appointment. So here we were trying to figure out how procrastination had taken hold of Frank’s life and put a stranglehold on him, and how it had convinced him that he “couldn’t be bothered”

Although all of us can suffer occasional bouts of procrastination, delaying and avoiding things we need to do, the degree of procrastination that Frank was suffering was in the big leagues. It was ongoing, unremitting and unrelenting. It was having serious affects of Frank’s life and his ability to achieve goals, small and large. Procrastination is a blight that affects the lives of many people causing paralysis, stagnation and immobility. However, these are only the initial effects of procrastination, when it goes on for a while it will cause secondary damage to a person’s self-esteem, sense of self-worth and happiness. This feeds into the procrastination cycle making it harder to escape the trap

This post will be the first on the theme of procrastination, given the degree to which it affects people’s lives and how the presence of procrastination can make it even harder for people to take the steps needed to overcome it. Each post will deal with one specific strategy for overcoming procrastination. This post will tackle the idea of “I can’t be bothered”.

Frank didn’t suffer from a shortage of good ideas for his life, indeed I was struck by just how many good ideas he had. Instead he found that his ideas were struck down before they had a chance to get going. One of the main culprits in this stagnation was the thought “I can’t be bothered”. Frank just accepted that this idea of not being bothered must be true, after all he didn’t bother, and he didn’t get things done so it must be true. Actually though, it proved not to be a very accurate thought at all. For example, when I asked Frank about why he wanted to call friends to invite them to go out to dinner, he spoke about how he would enjoy the evening, he liked spending time with these friends, he would feel good about making the call rather than putting it off, it would break down the sense of isolation he sometimes fell into, it would get him out of the house. The list of benefits went on and on. There were lots of good reasons to be bothered about making a phone call. These were reasons that mattered to Frank and he could be bothered. It was just an idea, a thought that convinced him in the moment that he couldn’t be bothered, but it wasn’t true (unless he went with the thought and then it became a sort of self-fulfilling prophesy).

The ‘trick’ to overcoming procrastination, was to put a stop to the thought that he couldn’t be bothered and to remind himself of all the reasons he could be bothered. If he took the time to remind himself of the benefits of making the call then it became easier to pick up the phone and start dialling. Each time Frank found himself thinking ‘I can’t be bothered’, his task was to stop this thought, block it, and then replace it with all the reasons he could be bothered. This three step process of stop, block and replace was the first key in Frank’s strategy to overcome procrastination.

Further strategies will be outlined in future posts.

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