How To Stop Procrastinating

How to Stop Procrastinating 20/03/2023, 21:47
Personal Productivity
How to Stop Procrastinating

by Alice Boyes
From the Magazine (May–June 2022)
Vanessa Branchi
Summary. Do you keep postponing work you need to do? The problem probably
stems from one of three things: your habits and systems (or lack thereof), your
desire to avoid negative emotions (like anxiety and boredom), or your own flawed
thinking patterns (which can... more
https://hbr.org/2022/05/how-to-stop-procrastinating?utm_source=i…stagram-story&utm_content=curated%3A-how-to-stop-procrastinating Page 1 of 12
Most of us procrastinate. We feel guilty about it and criticize

ourselves for it. And yet we still do it. Why? Because of at least
three factors: the absence of good habits and systems (poor
discipline), intolerance for particular emotions (like anxiety or
boredom), and our own flawed thinking patterns.
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When you understand these causes, you can use strategies that
target them. You can minimize minor incidents of procrastination
—such as when you drag your heels and don’t start a project until
close to its due date—and head off the bigger problems your
patterns of delay are causing.
Your Habits (or Lack Thereof)
A common theory is that procrastination is the result of a lack of

discipline. Procrastinators choose leisure and fun over hard work.
A more modern variation of this explanation is that they don’t
have good systems and habits. Multiple studies have shown that
strong habits reduce our need for self-control. They make it easier
to stick to effortful behaviors and resist distractions. But the
process of establishing a habit that confers such benefits usually
takes a few months.
To assess whether this is an issue for you, ask yourself: What

habits do I have in place to tackle my most important tasks? If the
answer is none, try these approaches:
Schedule your deep work consistently. I define deep work as
focusing on your most important long-term project. It might

entail, say, crafting a business strategy, doing complex data
analysis, or writing a book. Deep work is generally challenging,
but doing it consistently each day, in a regular pattern, will make
it less so.
Habits make sequences of behavior more automatic. Consider

that once we’re no longer novice drivers, we don’t consciously
think about what we do whenever we get behind the wheel of a
car. More-complex habits like going to the gym or learning a
language can also become more automatic. That happens through
repetition and cuing. So you shouldn’t attempt to do deep work at
11:00 in the morning one day and 3:00 in the afternoon the next.
And even if the exact time you settle into it isn’t the same, your
deep work should fit into your day in the same pattern: After I do
this, I do my deep work. For example, each day after spending up
to an hour on email and administrative tasks, I start my deep-
work session, which for me usually involves writing.
Create a system for starting new tasks. What about

responsibilities you’re handling for the first time that feel outside
your wheelhouse? You’ll be less likely to put novel tasks off if you
have a master system for approaching them. The steps you take
when you encounter something new will become their own type
of habit, which will reduce decision fatigue about how to start.
My own system involves a consistent sequence of steps: First, I

consider three options for how I could approach the task. Next, I
conduct a premortem analyzing the things that are most likely to
go wrong. Then I calculate how long I should spend on the task.
And last, I find ways to quickly test my assumptions.
How can you develop your own system? Reverse engineer it:
Bring to mind an example of a challenging task you’ve completed
successfully and identify the steps you used to accomplish it. I
prefer this approach to attempting to copy someone else’s
methods, because it will result in a system that suits your own
nature and strengths.
Your Emotions
We tend to avoid tasks that stir up negative emotions. In

psychology, avoidance and its close cousin, rumination, are
known as transdiagnostic factors—that is, they’re symptoms of
many common mental-health difficulties. People who cope with
stress by using avoidance tactics are more vulnerable to
depression, anxiety, ADHD, and eating disorders, and it becomes
a vicious cycle. When their mental health worsens, their
avoidance does too.
But even people who only sometimes feel sad, doubtful, and
anxious about their work—or can’t tolerate the boredom or stress
it induces—tend to avoid tasks that evoke such emotions. This
response is heightened during periods of uncertainty. When you
feel overwhelmed, you’re more likely to procrastinate. In this
state even simple tasks, such as replying to emails, can seem
daunting.
To know whether your emotions are the primary reason you put
work off, ask yourself: How is my mental health? Do the tasks I
avoid inspire certain emotions? Do they make me bored, angry,
anxious, or resentful? Then try these strategies:
Disentangle your feelings. Accurately identifying your emotions

—something psychological researchers term emotional
granularity—will help you manage them. When it comes to
procrastination, it’s also useful to analyze how much each

emotion is affecting your attitude toward a task. For example, you
might find that writing a presentation for your boss provokes
anxiety at a level of 8 on a scale of one to 10, resentment at a level
of 6, and boredom at a level of 4. Once you’ve determined that,
you can then address the emotions individually. The rating
system will help you evaluate how effective you are at minimizing
them.
When a task bores you, schedule a reward for completing it or do

it in a more fun way—for example, with teammates you like.
When a task makes you feel resentful or irritated, find what you
genuinely value about it. Maybe you get annoyed by having to
make the revisions that your supervisor asks for, but you really
value honing your craft. You may feel resentful about cross-
division committee work but value the opportunity to improve
your organization’s culture. You may get frustrated by a
teammate’s request for tech help but value being a supportive
colleague.
Vanessa Branchi
When a task makes you anxious, start with the elements of it that
make you the least apprehensive and progress from there. This is
exposure therapy: gradually working up to what most scares you.
What seems unmanageable initially will feel within your grasp
once you’ve worked through the easiest steps.
This approach to turning difficult emotions into greater focus and

dedication is part of a skill set called psychological flexibility,
which was developed by the psychologist Todd Kashdan and his
team. The more people use it, the happier, healthier, and higher
performing they tend to be.
Use self-compassion to overcome strong negative memories.

Sometimes the emotions we have about a task are driven by a
prior experience. Here’s a story from my own life that illustrates
this.
The first time I gave a talk about my research at a conference, it

didn’t go very well. I was a grad student. I lived in New Zealand,
and the conference was in Australia. I decided to fly into a bigger
city near the conference and take an overnight bus to the smaller
city where it was being held because the flight was cheaper. I
wasn’t in the best shape when I arrived. I felt like a deer in the
headlights and stared down at my notes while reading my talk. I
can still viscerally recall what it felt like to be in that room and
look out at that audience, which included my adviser and my
teammates, feeling that they were objectively better than I was at
everything research-related, especially presentations.
Now when I need to give a talk, that 20-year-old memory comes

flooding in. Suddenly I become my younger self, and all the skills
and confidence I’ve developed in the years since slip through my
fingers. When hit with such powerful memories, even people with
excellent project management and problem-solving skills can find
that they go out the window.
If you notice yourself having this kind of reaction, examine

whether it’s related to an event from your childhood, early career,
or more-recent work. Consider, too, whether there’s a pattern to
the types of tasks and memories involved.
A lot of compelling research shows that you can heal these

emotional wounds with compassionate self-talk. Here’s an
example of what that sounds like: “I’ve been disappointed with
my performance in the past, and that’s making me hesitant.
That’s a normal and understandable feeling. But I was a beginner
then, and I’m not now. It’s OK to learn through experience.” Find
and then reuse self-talk that works for you.
Your Thought Patterns
If you’re reasonably well disciplined in many areas but struggle in

others, specific thought patterns may be to blame. Some cognitive
factors involved in procrastination are pretty universal—for
example, most of us underestimate the complexity of tasks that
have long deadlines—while others are deeply personal.
Here’s one of my own problematic patterns: When people tell me

that they like a particular piece of my writing, I tend to jump to
the conclusion that my other stuff is no good, which ties me in
knots when it’s time to write again—even though I’ve just
received praise!
To figure out whether cognitive blocks are contributing to your

procrastination, ask yourself: Does the task feel more difficult
than the steps objectively are, given my skills? Do I quite enjoy (or
at least get a sense of satisfaction from) a task once I start it? If the
answer is yes, it implies that you tend to think about work in a
way that makes it seem more unpleasant than it actually is. Try
these strategies to navigate past your cognitive blocks:
Reverse brainstorm. Although I didn’t use reverse brainstorming

much before putting it into my book Stress-Free Productivity, it
has since become one of my favorite tactics. When applied to
procrastination, it involves considering what you would do to
make your task impossibly hard or something you’d really want to

avoid doing. Once you have those answers, you then come up
with their opposites, which will make you feel less blocked.
For example, a task might seem unachievable if I imagine having

to get it perfect the first time or having to do it in the exact same
style as a colleague that I admire. The flip side of this is that the
task will seem easier if I accept that missteps and imperfections
will occur and if I approach it in my own way, harnessing my own
strengths.
Another quick reframing technique is to think about all the ways

that a task you’re putting off is similar to one you can do easily
and well. For example, I feel incredibly comfortable writing blog
posts but not speeches. However, both involve making a few
points quickly, keeping the language conversational, telling
stories, and giving the audience a “that’s me” experience. The key
here is to define the parallels very specifically, as I have.
Learn to accept friction-filled work. Familiar, moderately

productive tasks tend to be accomplished smoothly and can thus
feel more satisfying than novel ones that are more difficult but
offer greater potential value. That’s why we often choose to check
minor items off our to-do lists rather than tackle projects that will
have more impact.
Don’t make the mistake of equating frictionless work with

productivity. Diverse teams, for example, often generate better
ideas but can experience more tension. Novel work is often full of
friction, which inherently slows progress and can cause stress.
That leads to a common cognitive error called emotional
reasoning, which happens when you overextrapolate from how
you feel. When you feel tense and challenged, for instance, you
might conclude that you’re moving in the wrong direction or not

making enough progress. It’s important to understand this
phenomenon and recognize when it’s happening to you.
Metacognition, or awareness of your thinking processes, can help
you counteract mental errors.
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Keep in mind that if you show up to do important work and

approach it as strategically as you can, you will make progress,
even if it doesn’t feel that way. The more tolerant you are of
friction-filled work, the less you’ll procrastinate. Commit to doing
the task that has the most potential for some period each day,
even when it results in tumultuous feelings and thoughts.
Limit yourself to short work periods. When a task is important or

we’ve been putting it off, we often believe we need marathon
work sessions to get it done. In most cases this thinking stems
from self-criticism sparked by guilt over lost productivity. But the
prospect of slogging away on a challenging task all day tends to
trigger more procrastination.
Read more about
5 Strategies for Getting More Work Done in Less Time
https://hbr.org/2022/05/how-to-stop-procrastinating?utm_source=i…tagram-story&utm_content=curated%3A-how-to-stop-procrastinating Page 10 of 12
Here, you can try one of two strategies: (1) Plan to work on
whatever you’re avoiding for 10 minutes today and pick it up
again tomorrow. Doing a little today will get you over the
emotional hump of starting. (2) Plan to tackle it for 90 minutes
today and cap it at that. If you’re reasonably conditioned to deep
work, it’s likely that you can get yourself to do almost anything for
that amount of time. It’s a reasonable goal. You can also adapt this
principle. For example, you might try a strategy like adding an
extra 10 minutes each workday to the time you spend on the task
until you get to two hours total. It’s like training yourself for an
endurance race.
...
In any self-help article it’s important to acknowledge the limits of

the advice given. If a persistent mental-health problem like
depression or anxiety is contributing to your procrastination,
then you should pursue an evidence-based treatment, ideally
with the help of a professional, not struggle along on your own. As
your mood and anxiety improve, you’ll be less prone to feeling
overwhelmed and frozen.
Also, even though I’ve broken down the causes of procrastination

into three categories here, they are interrelated. Your behavior
(habits and systems), emotions, and thoughts are all connected.
So no matter what the primary reason is for your tendency to put
off certain tasks, any of the strategies here should help you more
consistently attend to work that you have trouble mustering the
energy or focus to complete. Think of it as a menu for combating
procrastination, experiment with several options, and find the
ones that work best for you.
Editor’s note: Alice Boyes, PhD is the author of Stress-Free

Productivity, from which this article is adapted.
A version of this article appeared in the May–June 2022 issue of Harvard

Business Review.
Alice Boyes, PhD is a former clinical

psychologist turned writer and the author of
The Healthy Mind Toolkit, The Anxiety Toolkit,
and Stress-Free Productivity.
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How to Stop Procrastinating 20/03/2023, 21:47

How to Stop Procrastinating

From the Magazine (May–June 2022)

Most of us procrastinate. We feel guilty about it and criticize

00:00 / 17:00

To hear more, download Noa app for iPhone or Android.

Your Habits (or Lack Thereof)

A common theory is that procrastination is the result of a lack of

To assess whether this is an issue for you, ask yourself: What

Schedule your deep work consistently. I define deep work as

focusing on your most important long-term project. It might

Habits make sequences of behavior more automatic. Consider

Create a system for starting new tasks. What about

My own system involves a consistent sequence of steps: First, I

We tend to avoid tasks that stir up negative emotions. In

Disentangle your feelings. Accurately identifying your emotions

procrastination, it’s also useful to analyze how much each

When a task bores you, schedule a reward for completing it or do

This approach to turning difficult emotions into greater focus and

Use self-compassion to overcome strong negative memories.

The first time I gave a talk about my research at a conference, it

Now when I need to give a talk, that 20-year-old memory comes

If you notice yourself having this kind of reaction, examine

A lot of compelling research shows that you can heal these

Your Thought Patterns

If you’re reasonably well disciplined in many areas but struggle in

Here’s one of my own problematic patterns: When people tell me

To figure out whether cognitive blocks are contributing to your

Reverse brainstorm. Although I didn’t use reverse brainstorming

make your task impossibly hard or something you’d really want to

For example, a task might seem unachievable if I imagine having

Another quick reframing technique is to think about all the ways

Learn to accept friction-filled work. Familiar, moderately

Don’t make the mistake of equating frictionless work with

might conclude that you’re moving in the wrong direction or not

Subscribe to our Bimonthly Newsletter

Keep in mind that if you show up to do important work and

Limit yourself to short work periods. When a task is important or

Read more about

5 Strategies for Getting More Work Done in Less Time

In any self-help article it’s important to acknowledge the limits of

Also, even though I’ve broken down the causes of procrastination

Editor’s note: Alice Boyes, PhD is the author of Stress-Free

A version of this article appeared in the May–June 2022 issue of Harvard

Alice Boyes, PhD is a former clinical

Recommended For You

5 Research-Based Strategies for Overcoming Procrastination

Stop Procrastinating and Tackle That Big Project

To Keep People from Procrastinating, Don't Give Them a Deadline

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