I tend to be a procrastinator. It is a struggle I have always had. There are just so many things I want to explore and do and I will do ALL.THE.THINGS besides the one un-fun, difficult, or overwhelming thing I should be doing.
If you can identify, I wanted to share some little hacks that I have found to overcome my procrastendency (and yes, I just made that word up and feel pretty proud of myself.)
Here are 6 ways I overcome procrastination:
- BRAIN DUMP – Make a list of everything I need to do from small things to big projects. This gets it out of my brain so it can refocus.
- BREAK IT DOWN – Reverse engineer what needs to get done into smaller tasks and set short milestone deadlines, a little reward doesn’t hurt – Coffee works for me!
- DO THE HARDEST THING FIRST – If I can get past the hard stuff on my to-do list and the rest is a breeze.
- SET A TIMER – Use my timer app and set it for 30-45 minutes and work on the task at hand the entire time without distraction.
- CHANGE MY ENVIRONMENT – Sometimes I just need a change of scenery. Move to another room, desk, or outside to do that task. Also, I may need to clean up my environment (which can indeed turn into a way to procrastinate if I’m not careful).
- AIRPLANE MODE/DO NOT DISTURB – Let’s be honest, the worst distraction is that little rectangle we carry around called a smart phone. Tell friends and family that I will be unavailable at a specific time and turn the phone off or to a mode so I won’t get notifications.
It’s so easy to get distracted right now as we have been home more and want to get all our projects done. As an Enneagram 7 I tend to have so many tabs open in my brain that I end up dillydallying my way around them all! These hacks help my monkey mind and I hope they can help you find your way past your procratendencies. as well.