The Chasm of Procrastination

“How soon ‘not now’ becomes ‘never’.

- Martin Luther King Jr

We tend to believe that timing is key, patience is a virtue and preparation and planning equal perfection – the pathway to a sure thing! Remember the 7 P’s? If not, it goes like this: Prior Preparation and Planning Prevents Piss Poor Performance. A mantra often repeated when we are toiling away at something that’s in the way of where we want to go.

Here’s the thing; it’s never perfect, it’s never done there’s always more preparation and planning that can be done, there will always be ambiguity. It’s fear holding you back in the disguise of procrastination. A seemingly unassuming title for a paralysing state.

Procrastination is not laziness, let’s not get this confused. Lazy people simply don’t do anything and are just fine with it. Procrastinators, on the other hand, have the desire to do something but can’t force themselves to start to take the first step. They can be perfectionists, hard workers, completer finishers, earnest workers that have been celebrated all their life for their perfect effort. It grooms us into believing the safe unsatisfactory option may be the best plan and our dreams get extinguished in the process. Recent studies have shown that people have more regret for the things they haven't done than the things they messed up. You need a plan but not a paralysing set of requirements that stop you moving forward. Intention and measured action build and momentum is everything in moving towards the future you want. 

In our coaching work we see that lack of action is generally a product of fear. Built and reinforced by limiting beliefs. Those subconscious things we tell ourselves every day that prevent us from acting on our intentions towards our vision; otherwise known as procrastinating. Let’s spell this out:

 When fear intersects intention and action, we get a chasm called procrastination.

It’s a debilitating space. Whether it’s a fear of not being good enough, or fear of not getting it right, fear prevents people from tackling bigger tasks. There are moments when everything in your being will tell you that now is the time, yet often our limiting beliefs force us to pause, and we hold off until we find another reason not to progress.

Why are we like that? What do we fear? Life’s purpose and vision is different for everyone, and sometimes we often think we don’t know what our vision is, we are undeserving, not capable, it’s ‘safer’ or ‘better’ to stay where we are. Feelings of regret and guilt resulting from missed opportunities tend to stay with people much longer, in fact to their death bed. It’s neither ‘safer’ nor ‘better’ to sit in the inaction.

 We all have a vision or dreams of what we would be doing if life had no consequences, some role, passion project or calling for our lives, yet we often make a choice and keep life as it is even if it’s not as we want.  We go to school, qualify, get a job, get married, have kids and/or animals, and grow old. Don’t get me wrong, these life milestones are beautiful and should be celebrated and appreciated. However, we often hear from clients that they want more in their lives. Often, they are truly blessed with amazing family, lovers, partners, a career they love, a circle of friends that cannot be replaced. We need to be grateful for these things yet there is nothing wrong with wanting more, something different or even just to feel better..

It is so easy to be satisfied in life, especially when things are going well. You get caught in the trap of content or discontent; both can be equally limiting. You will know if you are stuck; you feel restless, distracted, the thief of comparison will filter through your thoughts. Somehow the discomfort feels more comfortable. You know what you want and often know what’s requires to get there, yet you stop.

Instead of waiting for signs to do something that you always wanted to do, take the time to design a vision and plan out your life, stop allocating your resources to staying put! Every single choice and action matters, no matter how small. The things you spend your time on and the people you spend your time with can make all the difference in whom you become.

Moving away from procrastination often needs behaviour change. You may not struggle with discipline, you may often incorporate better habits into life daily, write to-do lists, set goals, and even have accountability partners. Even though these intentions are good, they can often fall short of the decisive, courageous action required to jump the chasm of procrastination. You need to be intentional with everyday decisions, your time, have a clear vision and ACT if I want to get to where you’d rather be.

The last few crazy years has taught us, life is short, and it can change in an instant, it’s something to be cherished and as the world slowed, we were at home more. Productivity seemed to take on a different context, you may have started to realise that all the excuses that existed before, about not having enough time, being too tired or waiting for the perfect time were lies. You may have thought they were valid reasons for not progressing to where you wanted to go, when in actuality you may have been procrastinating and finding reasons to explain away the fear

We are a month down in 2022 already. How are you going? Is it time to help define what your life vision is? Are you doing all you can to work towards that? Is there anything that you feel you can do more of to progress? If your answer is yes, then go do it because the cost of procrastination is the life you could have lived. Life in the procrastination chasm is no fun! Write that book, start that new passion pursuit, start your business, or start making your transition into a new career. You must move differently if you want different.

One year from now, you can either have a year of progress or a year of excuses.

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