Procrastination…Choice or Compulsion?

7 points to eliminate procrastination in your life!

Procrastination is the biggest hurdle that haunts most of us and impedes our progress. This is one of the main reasons for us being unhappy, unfulfilled, and unsuccessful. This is because we are not where we wanted to be at a certain point in time. It may be of our health, wealth, Family, Relationships, Career, Business…to name a few important areas in our life.

But, have you ever thought about why do you procrastinate? What are the root causes? How to overcome that? How to go about keep doing what we want to do so that we can reach a point of success at any stage in our life. The root cause generally lies in not knowing exactly what you want to do, what you want to achieve. That is to say, the lack of clarity about different areas of our life. How do you get that clarity which makes you crystal clear as to what you want to achieve in different spheres of your wheel of life?

1. Know Yourself!

The first thing is about knowing what you really are viz. The Real You. It first involves finding your personality type and see which state in that personality type you spend most of your time viz. Very good state, Good state, satisfactory state, unhealthy state, etc. Our aim should be to spend most of our time in a good or very good state.

You need to train your mind to make it believe that you spend most of the time in a good state or very good state only. That’s to say, make positive thinking a habit. Though it is easier said than done, you need to make an effort and make it happen gradually. You can enroll with me for a 10 weeks Incredible You program to get assured results on these aspects. Please visit navneetfamilycoach.com.

It also encompasses knowing about your core values, how those core values are being met or not being met in different areas of our life. Then comes the part of making these core values meet all the areas in your life. There are NLP based processes available through which you can easily know your top core values and then manage them suitably to make them meet those areas. This process removes all the confusion in our minds and gives clarity, including the explanations for that why?

2. Be Organized

The second point for removing procrastination is all about being organized. Being organized means doing the things when it is supposed to be done, as per the plan you have chalked out.  Yes, you need to draw out a plan for it first. Now, how to draw out a plan? It is best to start backward. First, decide on the milestone event and the date by which you want to achieve it. Start working backward now, step by step till you reach the present moment.

This will give you a clear idea as to how you need to proceed, how much time you need to devote, how much hard effort you need to invest, resources required, etc. First your goal, then the milestones you need to achieve each month, and finally break down those monthly milestones into weekly targets/milestones and the daily ones finally. Please mail me at navneethfamilycoach@gmail.com to get the readymade template I have prepared for the same.

3. Follow a Productive Routine

The third point for removing procrastination is to get into that habit, a routine of following what you have chalked out already. Being organized and Following routine are different. In being organized, you have made the preparations viz. chalked out the plan and now it is the routine that you need to follow strictly, to make that plan work as per your aim. It is all about making it a habit in the initial stages.

Yes, the most difficult days are those initial 30 days or so, to make it a habit and make it work for you. The routine of the day starts with spending time for the upkeep of your body, mind, and soul. If you have been lazy and never did any physical exercise, just try starting with a 10 minutes walk….and gradually increase it to 45 minutes over 45 to 60 days.

Now, what can you do for your mind and soul?….maybe some meditation, listening to hymns/songs, doing something you love to do viz. gardening, playing with your pet, and even cooking. If you are a good cook and married… that is going to help you get that extra harmony at home!. The best activity is to spend some quality time with your family, away from all the gadgets and distractions. Can you start sparing a mere 15 minutes just for your family, especially children? Then gradually increase it to 45 to 60 minutes.

4. Power of Repetition

The fourth point for removing procrastination is the art of making your mind always remember your daily goals subconsciously. The art repetition is the best way to make you keep remembering and reminding yourself of the daily, weekly, monthly, and yearly milestones. It is better to keep one step at a time. That is, make it a habit of completing/achieving your everyday targets/milestones/goals. This way, the daily milestones are going to contribute to the weekly milestones, the weekly ones to the monthly milestones, the monthly ones to the yearly milestones, and so on.

You need to be serious, dedicated, and strict on your daily milestones. This way automatically you start achieving your monthly and yearly milestones and so on. That’s to say, One Small Step at a time….will contribute to achieving your life goals finally. Please mail me at navneethfamilycoach@gmail.com or visit navneetfamilycoach.com,  to get the readymade template for this process.

5. Importance of Support Group

The fifth pointfor removing procrastination is to be aware of people who are adding value to your life and who is not. It requires a conscious effort to deliberately consider all those people with whom you are spending maximum time with and decide, from a neutral point of view whether they are adding value to achieving your goals, ambitions, dreams, and outcomes?

You need to consciously think, decide, and admit in your mind about those people and suitably manage them according to your goals. If they are adding value to your life, then you need to spend more time with them and add on to that value. You need to be very careful about those toxic people who are dragging you down, than doing any value addition. The best is to reduce your interaction as far as possible with those people.

We call those people who add value to your people a Master Mind group of people. This support group consists of those well-wishers who push you, cajole you, support you, help you, give an honest opinion, and who are positively contributing to your achieving goals. The toxic people on the other hand always drag you down and can be the main cause for procrastination.

6. Ration your time!

The sixth point for removing procrastination is the art of rationing time! Yes, as a human being you can’t be expected to be always thinking about your goals and working only. That will lead to burn out and finally procrastination again. Hence, you need to ration your time judiciously between leisure and work.

A balanced time management will achieve the aim of rejuvenating you frequently to give that impetus to indulge in your work with renewed vigor and interest. The aim is to be able to sustain the momentum towards your goals, by giving yourself little rejuvenation times in between. So, you will be able to overcome that weakness of procrastinating and bash on regardless.

7. Set up Practical Goals!

The seventh point for removing procrastination is one of the most important one, if not the most important, is the ability to set up and plan achievable goals. People may say nothing is impossible. Yes, it is correct. But, imagine you set up a goal for traveling to the moon in one month! Is it possible? When you put a timeline for a goal then you need to consciously consider its possibility of achieving within that timeline and also the resources available! I coach this process in my Incredible You program. For further details, you can contact me at navneethfamilycoach@gmail.com or visit  navneetfamilycoach.com.

When you set up achievable goals and make your mind aware of that it is achievable, then the process of further travel on the path to your goals, without any procrastination becomes very easy. When you set up an impossible goal, considering the timeline and resources, then you may tend to procrastinate at the first chance of failure, because that’s what the mind wants to believe. So, it is very important to follow the correct process, to set up achievable goals. This will strengthen the belief system of our mind that it is achievable and accordingly push you to achieve what you want to achieve. My next blog will be ‘The 7 little insignificant habits to overcome procrastination’.