Procrastination – 10 principles to help tame this monster 

‘the action of delaying or postponing something"

The Frog or the Procrastination Monster?

We all do it. We all hate doing it and we all encourage others not to do it. So why is it so painful to get those pesky chores done. S

Big projects with lots of small tasks, small projects with a few big tasks, day to day desk admin, freeing up the diary – its all just so overwhelming! Maybe it’s just simply sorting through your inbox. 

Do we Eat that Frog? Or let the Procrastination Monster prevail. Whatever the task to done or conversation to be had, we are all guilty of delaying or putting the things off that we feel are too uncomfortable to deal with.

What is procrastination?

So, that we get a better idea of why we procrastinate, let’s look at the human way of doing things naturally first.

Procrastination has naturally saved us. Yes that’s right. 100,000 years ago we were living in a completely different world. We lived to survive. Neanderthals lived in caves and only ventured out in the cold to hunt and gather. 

They had to determine whether it was safe to slowly approach a giant mammoth or a hungry tiger or just go for it and race towards it? The wrong decision could mean death. Imagine you in that scenario now… Very quickly your body would start to react. Your pulse quickens and breathing gets shallow, adrenaline starts to pump and your entire body starts reacting, your body starts producing adrenaline. This is all good, your body is telling you it’s time to fight or fly. Impulsive decision maybe dangerous but a more thought out approach with a good spear and more of you could mean survival. 

Pain points – fight or flight

If we replace these beasts for your ‘to do list’ whether it be family, work or personal stress we are now in the modern times. The tasks that we perceive to be stressful or we see as a pain points cause us anxiety. Our bodies are saying ‘you’re not safe, stop and walk away’

So there you have it, procrastination is an adaptive mechanism that is part of our mammalian survival instinct – fight or flight at its finest. It is meant to help us cope with stress and keep us safe. 

Children hate homework, right? They hate making their beds? For some eating their vegetables at the dinner table is quite painful. 

Parents enforce this with reasoning and sounding out the consequences of not doing these things. After picking the right battles the parent wins and the child feels they have achieved something not as painful as they thought. A lesson if you like on how manage and survive life as they grow up.

BUT as adults we have to manage ourselves. We have to manage our time, our workload, our families, finances and illness. We are incredible beings that deal with huge amounts of responsibility and accountability every day. Sometime we just want to do the easy bits or the things that we enjoy. However, those pain points stay on the to do list and todays stress becomes tomorrow’s and so on.

So how do we find solutions to overcoming those pain points in our everyday? Here is the good news… you don’t have to do this alone. And it’s never too late to go back to basics and rethink things.

Here’s the 10 principles to stop procrastination that we apply here at Bizzie PA. 

1. Remove all distractions from the room – yes that’s the mobile!
2. Work in a decluttered space
3. Start by organising your tasks and prioritise – Using 1, 2, 3 
4. Breaks these tasks down into smaller ones – Using a, b, c
5. Note against each task why you might delay those tasks e.g. fear, difficult to do, don’t understand the task, are you tired?
6. Pick two. One important task and one that you get enjoyment from doing or that’s quick and easy
7. Unpacking each part of the task and write the action against it.
8. Action plans are good for ticking things off and give a sense of achievement. 
9. Set a realistic time to get this completed
10. Two solutions to get the task completed – “Delegate or do”:

i. Ask for help, be bold. People love to help each other; nobody will chastise you for saying you are stuck? In fact, they will more than likely offer more help than you need.

ii. Listen to music or set a timer for 25 minutes, take a break then repeat. 

  iii. The Pomodoro technique is great for time-management. For every 25 minutes (1 pomodoro) you give yourself a 5 minute break. 

For the tricky tasks that are taking longer than you planned and delaying you getting on with other things... simply park them and go back to STEP 4 and redo an action plan.

Help for procrastination

It's official here at Bizzie PA we help you stop procrastinating.

We see a whole host of tasks roll in day by day. To do list, tasks and conversations that our clients don’t have time to do or simply don’t want to do. People from all walks of life who want to focus on growing their business in their expert fashion, enjoying being that expert they set out to be and feeling a sense of achievement. 

By handing over work and tasks that take time, both in stress and hours, the work is guaranteed to get done and clients become less   stressed.

Clients choose the amount of time they need support for – ad hoc, short or long term.

Procrastination woes are instantly eased and your investment suddenly does great things for your business.

Outsourcing is becoming more and more popular amongst busy families’ small businesses and entrepreneurs. Many of our clients are small B2B who simply don’t require employed staff and all the overhead costs that go with that.

We are always welcoming new clients and are proud that we have such professional and trusted relationships with our existing. We work across all sorts of industries and have a broad commercial knowledge ensuring that our clients have the very best service. All personal assistant services are outstanding. 

As Founder of Bizzie PA, Liz Clark’s career started as international airline personnel. Working in some challenging situations against tight deadlines in a very public arena, her work ethic is to strive for customer service excellence. This philosophy has grown Bizzie PA successfully for nearly 14 years.

If you are a new Virtual Assistant or PA looking to expand, please do get in touch

Here are some interesting links:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mNBmG24djoY – The Pomodoro Technique explained

https://pomofocus.io – The Pomodoro timer

https://www.briantracy.com/blog/time-management/the-truth-about-frogs/ - Eat that Frog