Struggling with procrastination. Can anyone help?

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excaliber, sorry for the procrastination joke about getting around to answering you soon. 😊

I think you need to practice just doing things, without the counter thoughts.

Perhaps scheduling things. I pay bills on Saturday mornings. If it’s Saturday morning, it’s time to pay bills, because that when I do it. Let’s see, what bills do I have to pay…

There can always be a counter thought, but it’s rarely useful.

You sound like someone who has to take a shower, but the hot water heater is broken. You stand in the bathroom for an hour, trying to get the nerve up to go under the cold water. Well, it’s just as cold now as will be in an hour so just hold your breath and step under the water.
 
Cat said:
When it comes to reading your Bible or praying, try abandoning all your ideas about “how” this should be done.

You picture sitting in a chair or at the Adoration Chapel studying and taking notes and praying entire Rosaries. No wonder you’re daunted.

Try this instead. Make a copy on a computer of a verse that you really like. Just one verse or maybe a few verses.

Make the copies small, post-it note sized.

Make multiple copies and post them all over your living spaces. On cupboards, in the bathroom, at work on your locker, car dashboard, in your wallet, etc.

Throughout the day, your eyes will light on this verse several times, and you will be reminded of the truths in the verse.

Hope this helps.

When it comes to prayer, try something that St. Paul did. If you read his epistles, a lot of times, he “makes mention” of people in his prayers (those are his words). So just make mention of people and situations. Say a quick. “Lord, bless my spouse” as you catch sight of your spouse. Driving to work, pray, “Lord, help the president” as you listen to the radio. At work, say, “Grant us peace.” etc.

The main reason people procrastinate is that they are perfectionists. They cannot accept anything less than perfection, and since they KNOW that their effort probably won’t be perfect, they stall about doing anything to avoid facing their own inadequacies and imperfect accomplishments.

For this reason, you need to try to whittle down various tasks into smaller tasks that you can complete with some degree of proficiency . ANYONE can pray, “Bless the boss.” That’s a perfect prayer. ANYONE can read one verse hanging from the dash board while you’re sitting at a traffic light. That’s a perfect reading of the Holy Bible. See, you’ve done a perfect job. Now just keep doing these perfect “little” jobs. You don’t have to put things off anymore!

Eventually you will learn to do bigger tasks and accept imperfections in your work.
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Your right!!!
I could pray more but I feel bad because of all the procrastination. So I feel ashamed. But I prayed anyway because Jesus touched the lepor in this weeks reading.

And some days I won’t read my bible because I think what’s the use…I don’t have hours to do it right, so why do it.

I am going to write things down,
starting tommorow…

Just kidding!!!

Starting today, I will write them down.

Little by little, meat in the middle.
 
ohioszo said:
Making lists works when I’m heading into Easter or Christmas. Just at the time when we are sometimes told to throw away our to-do lists!

Some things can’t go on a list:

I want to tell a story: We live at the end of a sewer line. Now, when the toilet doesn’t flush well, the problem could exacerbate: We can actually have the sewer back-up into our basement. New to me! So, how long does it take for us to figure this out, how can it be prevented, who to call, etc.!

We find that if nothing is done immediately, the situation can escalate into something rather terrible.

First time, in denial. Didn’t call the city maintenance even. “Just a hard rain coming in back basement door.”

Second time, a discussion ensued about the cause: historical precedence was mentioned (nothing like this in 50 years.) Still some denial, could it be just water? City maintenance called and responded. Told by them that it is difficult to determine after the fact … it wasn’t. City Hall doesn’t respond though, we are in this alone.

Third time, the situation was caught as it happened still a serious mess. Family was called, opinion sought. Blame put on city maintenance - non existant? City Hall called - left message, so, police called maintenance because it was a holiday. It was Christmas Eve, in fact!

Fourth time, caught at the start despite ignoring a red flag by household member. Paid for a professional who found a a palmful of hair-like roots. City maintenance in denial; this time, they are we think. We had stopped our water usage as soon as we caught the overflow, to ameliorate the situation.

Fifth time, red flag cited by woman of the house, not ignored and the city is called immediately. All water activity is ceased until the city maintenance check. A major blockage found and cleared. (Roto-router not called for advice, per usual, we tell the city about our innocence.) We were able to have a day of high water usage, despite snow melt and rain, high flood levels elsewhere in NW OH.

Procrastination by ourselves, one might ask, where? One simply needs to think, discuss, get a head of things. It could be something involving one’s children. Can you see the red flags, do you know how to get help, does one have to wait until the situation is extremely unbearable, when one’s soul is endangered, perhaps.

(Our city *is *seeking money to update the sewers: They want to separate them and they want to have electronic monitoring of the flow. After 50 years of never having this situation with the city: We will need to be watchful in order to ameliate it and to call immediately. I know this is small compared to NOLA, or even local flooding in cities with rivers.)
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This story is an example of another reason why people procrastinate: they are afraid.

A woman needs to schedule her mammogram, but she’s afraid that she’ll have cancer.

Someone needs to have the car overhauled, but they’re afraid it will cost several thousand dollars that they don’t have.

Someone wants to write a novel, but they’re afraid they won’t be able to do it, or they’re afraid that if they do write it, it will be really bad and get rejected by publishers.

I’m not the best at facing down fears, but I think that hearing stories like the one by ohioszo is helpful. I have a friend who always gets her mammograms (she’s a heavy smoker), and one year they did discover a “spot” and it turned out to be malignant and they did a lumpectomy and it’s fine and it’s been years. HAD my friend procrastinated, she would probably be dead.

Same with cars–get it looked at right away and it might just turn out to be a $20 problem instead of morphing into a $2000 problem.

And write the novel! So you get rejected–big deal. Maybe it means you have to learn to write better–big deal! It’s fun to learn to write better! As for rejections, I have written several novels about synchronized skating, and I got tons of rejections, and I finally talked to an editor in person who said, “No one will publish niche stories like this because there isn’t enough interest. They’re good novels, but they’re niche.” So I decided to do a print-on-demand publication so that the few people in the country who are interested can read stories about their sport. I’m no Rowling and never will be, but I sure get a good feeling when a teenaged skater comes up to me in a rink and says, “I just love your novels. Please write more.”

And even if no one reads my novels, I enjoy reading them because they allow me to re-live some of the best experiences of my life–the times that I’ve spent in a skating rink with my daughters and their friends.

So as Pope John Paul II said, “Fear not.”

This may sound gruesome, but when I am afraid of something, especially a physical pain, I always think about those poor soldiers in Iraq who are captured and beheaded with a butcher knife. I realize that the pain or the fear I am facing is NOTHING compared to this.
 
Hi Excaliber…

I’m a procrastinator, too…I have stuff I know I need to do, but I end up only getting to it when I feel pressured.

I’ll make the time now to say a prayer for you and I both that we can get motivated. For me, it might mean getting off this board…😉 It’s sort of addictive!
 
Helps if you say you’ll only do it for, say, seven minutes. Seven minutes is better than nothing and it will go by like THAT! Then you can move up to seven minutes, twice a day, etc. It’s not so overwhelming if you just do literally one thing at a time, like, vacuum today, windex the next day, and not force it all into one day/hour.
 
Cat said:
This story is an example of another reason why people procrastinate: they are afraid.
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What I am kind of dealing with is that I find that I have to convince others that something has serious consequences, or, that I have some sense about something that others do not have. Kind of like the Lord felt when he wasn’t listened too in his hometown. I really fear stupidity.

I’ve seen my nephew’s life go from bad to worse. Finally, after all the lousy things he did to himself, running away, stealing, fornication; he had a child who he abused. He allowed his child’s teeth to rot, while he spent money on collectibles to resell. Dragging the child with, BTW. All I did was worry and pray for little else could I do.

After I sent a letter to child welfare in the state he was living (sent in secret) … the child and the mother moved to another state (home to mom) and some good-hearted nurse paid the cost of dental care. The child was then about 5 or 6 when he finally got this care and his dad unfortunately claims him every summer. I won’t list the neglectful, mean abuse … worse then you would treat a dog. To top it off, the child loved me and I held him full diaper and all. They did everything wrong, fed him chicken wings and pancakes, noticed him only when bad, hollered at him when he was being good, etc.

I might have written a letter when I saw the mom shake the child’s legs as an infant (so the letter took 4 years) … which we had told her to stop, she didn’t … the child now has a speech disorder. I did mention it to a Priest (1 or 2 years,) and, he had told me to leave it alone. I don’t think the man is any longer a Priest.
 
From a procrastinator/perfectionist extraordinaire (or, the best advice I ever got from Flylady):

You can do anything for 15 minutes.

If it’s overwhelming, set a timer for 15 minutes, and just do it. One thing. Whatever is most pressing. When 15 minutes is up, you stop.

If it’s paying bills, set the timer for 15 minutes, and call up the credit card company and stay on the phone for 15 minutes or until the bill gets paid. If there is time left over, move to the next bill and work on it until that timer beeps. If you have to gather bill-paying materials, do just that for 15 minutes and then do the paying later on when you feel like setting the timer for that purpose again. (Chances are you’ll feel like it much sooner, because you’ve already set yourself up for a good session.)

If 15 minutes is too much, make it only 10 minutes. That is how I clean my house, in 10 minute segments.

This simple little idea gives you control. You control the amount of time you’ll spend on a task; the task does not overrun your energy or your time. When you feel in control, you’ll do something!

Go for it! Do it now! 🙂
 
Is it possible that you have attention deficit disorder? Folks with ADD have difficulties with executive functioning. Just a thought.
 
minnieg said:
From a procrastinator/perfectionist extraordinaire (or, the best advice I ever got from Flylady):

You can do anything for 15 minutes.

If it’s overwhelming, set a timer for 15 minutes, and just do it. One thing. Whatever is most pressing. When 15 minutes is up, you stop.

If it’s paying bills, set the timer for 15 minutes, and call up the credit card company and stay on the phone for 15 minutes or until the bill gets paid. If there is time left over, move to the next bill and work on it until that timer beeps. If you have to gather bill-paying materials, do just that for 15 minutes and then do the paying later on when you feel like setting the timer for that purpose again. (Chances are you’ll feel like it much sooner, because you’ve already set yourself up for a good session.)

If 15 minutes is too much, make it only 10 minutes. That is how I clean my house, in 10 minute segments.

This simple little idea gives you control. You control the amount of time you’ll spend on a task; the task does not overrun your energy or your time. When you feel in control, you’ll do something!

Go for it! Do it now! 🙂
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I am about to start organizing for 15 minuets.
Then I will break up my bill paying.

I think I don’t like paying bills because I was a part of a religious
society that was unpaid labor. So we did not buy much…then I was removed from that society. Now bills LOOK huge to me because I am not used to them.

Ahhhhhh!!!

Ok Im getting of here so I can do some for 15 minuets.
 
Great! Post back when you’ve done 15 minutes! I’ll cheerlead for you.
 
minnieg said:
Great! Post back when you’ve done 15 minutes! I’ll cheerlead for you.
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I did a number of tasks!!!
One step at a time YEA!!!
I realy realy want to beat this.

I don’t want to be a procrastinator, and I wasent like this in the past.

Next Im going to make a list, of tasks for each day the night before.
 
That’s a good idea, but don’t overwhelm yourself.

Pat yourself on the back for what you get done, but if there aren’t enough hours in the day for your list, then don’t beat yourself up.
 
My experience with procrastination is that sometimes it looks like on some days I wish a day had 36 hours and my energy can’t finish up, but later I can’t sleep at normal hours and I’m slow or I end up with short time intervals that are hard to fill with anything meaningful. Sometimes I end up tired but not yet sleepy and that’s bad because the only thing I’m good for in that condition is, well, procrastination. Means writing stuff on the internet, playing a game, maybe talking to someone, but ultimately just a wait-out kind of thing, which isn’t that great. I guess if you fill up your schedule and allow yourself rest when it’s needed - and you somehow pull off interrupting everything and going to bed when the time comes, then you’re golden. Doesn’t work so easily if you have sleeping problems like I do. At any rate, early to bed and early to rise and try having meaningful things to do with your time. At least don’t do the same old boring stuff over and over again just to kill time - a new diversion is not as good as work but it’s still better than same old wasting time. And anything with a storyline is better than anything without one. Signing up for organised activities should also help arrange your time. Not as great if you aren’t a group person, but maybe you don’t have it as bad as I do. And any time spent with people in a way that might benefit them is better than an activity that benefits no one, yourself included, and is solitary. So… yeah. Speaking of, time to see about ending the day (past midnight in my zone).
 
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