Tuesday, June 12, 2007

Avoid Procrastination

Millions of people are hurt by procrastination every year. What makes it worse is that they either don't realize it, or they are too lazy to do something about it. However, a successful person takes control of their life and doesn't allow procrastination to overtake them. Let's take a closer look at procrastination in this article.
First of all, what is procrastination? Procrastination is to habitually put off doing something that needs to be done. It is usually associated with a lazy person. For example, everyone needs to do their taxes. A successful person takes care of this as soon as possible, and then they don't have to worry about them. Procrastinators put it off until they absolutely have to take care of them. They wait until the deadline rolls around, and then they file for an extension. So, what could have been taken care of in January ends up haunting them in the back of their mind for many months. These types of distractions can be removed by successful people who take control of their lives.

Is procrastination bad? You may wonder what the harm is. In isolated incidences, procrastination is not a problem. However, it usually is a problem for most people. We are talking about repeatedly, out of habit, putting things off and instead of using their time wisely, they let their time waste away. Time is the only commodity that we can't get more of. We can always get more money. We can always buy new things, but we can do nothing to add a single minute to our lives. On our deathbed, we will be wishing that we spent more time with our families, not wishing that we spent more time playing video games or that we had spent more time on the job.

So, what can we do about procrastination? First of all, we need to recognize it for what it is. Some people are in denial about this. They rationalize to themselves that perhaps they are prioritizing their things to do. However, the litmus test for this is to ask what they are doing instead. If they are sitting on the couch, watching television and eating bonbons when they have things that they need to take care of, then they are lying to themselves. Don't be like this. Take control of your life. If you don't, something else will. Don't allow yourself to be a victim of life. Own your life. Do what you need to do so that you can enjoy your life. Be honest with yourself about this.

When you feel like your "to do" list is piling up, take a quick minute to look at the list. If it's not written down, write it down. You won't get them done if you don't write them down. Determine what the most urgent item is, and get started on it without delay. Make it a point to scratch one item off your list every day until your list is empty. What a relief that will be.

The key is that you have to tell yourself to do it, and then force yourself to take action. Don't trust yourself to just get things done whenever you have a spare minute. Make time right now. Tell yourself that this is how you combat procrastination. Don't fall victim to the trap of thinking that you can do these things whenever you want, because the truth is you will never want to do these items-that's why they are piling up.

Avoiding procrastination is not hard, if you are honest with yourself. You need to force yourself to take action today to chip away at all of the things that you need to get done. Get started right now. What are you going to work on?

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

need to spend timew wisely and live life to the fullness. william, start from now on, we need to avoid procrastination!!!
lets to it together, ok??

Anonymous said...

sorry, wrong spelling
i mean lets do it together