Procrastination. What is it and how to avoid it

"Procrastination" is a fancy word for the practice of delaying on tasks we know we need to do, filling our time with other things that aren't as necessary. Although people often confuse this behavior with laziness, this is not always the case.

Procrastination feeds on our fears

Fear of failure is a common reason for putting off our obligations. People who are afraid of failure are more likely to procrastinate than others. Why? Because they feel insecure about their ability to do the job correctly. This makes them look for ways to avoid possible failure, postponing the execution of the task in search of the best way to carry it out.

Fear of the unknown also makes us delay the obligation. A task that is larger than usual, or in a format that we have never used, or that requires the use of a

software that we do not master, can cause us to hold up starting it, seeking to gather the necessary knowledge.

The fear of criticism appears in an excess of perfectionism. Sometimes we want everything we do to be perfect before we start working on something new or taking steps to complete it. We can even think that if we do not do things perfectly, there is no point in doing them because others will criticize us if our work is not perfect enough.

If you're not sure what your fear is, think about how you feel when you procrastinate. The most common emotions are worry, anxiety and guilt, because we are aware that we should get down to work instead of distracting ourselves with something else.

The good news is that once we recognize these fears, we have taken an important step to overcome them and banish them from our work routine.

You can take advantage of your fears.

In the case of fear of failure, it can be interpreted as a positive sign, a mark that you take your work seriously. If it wasn't important to you, you wouldn't care if you were successful or not. As long as you don't let fear stop you from trying, you can use it to your advantage, turning it into motivation to work harder.

Fear of the unknown and excess of perfectionism, well conducted, can become an incentive to acquire new skills, learn new resources and take actions that lead to our work being of excellent quality.

Also, seeing failure as a normal part of life and learning from past mistakes makes success easier over time. You may have failed in the past, but you have learned to apply the necessary corrections and become skilled enough to succeed at this task. Taking time to acknowledge your progress is important because even if you may fail again later, at least the process will feel familiar and you'll know what to improve on. Over time, those feelings of fear will fade and be replaced by success and experience.

Postponing tasks reduces the time we dedicate to them and, therefore, their quality.

It is a fact that leaving tasks until the last minute will make them more difficult to complete. This is because when you procrastinate, you spend an inordinate amount of time mentally rehearsing the task, trying to figure out the best way to do it. In comparison, the actual time to be spent doing the work can be quite short. It's not uncommon for people to wait days or even weeks before starting a project, only to find that they complete it in much less time than they expected.

Also, waiting until the last minute often leads to lower-quality performance. This makes sense when you consider that most people spend 90% of their time preparing and only 10% executing. Instead of having enough time to review, edit, and tweak, we find ourselves in last-minute rush to meet the deadline. By procrastinating, you set yourself up for failure and negatively affect your ability to perform at your best on future tasks, because you inadvertently fuel the fear that forces you to procrastinate, coming full circle.

Social media is a source of distraction

When we surf the web, we falsely believe that we are using our time well. Because we use the internet for everything and it is a fundamental tool, we believe that all the time we spend browsing is useful and profitable. That makes us spend more time than necessary on pages that do not help our productivity.

It is not necessary to give up social networks, you just have to use them wisely. You must set time restrictions and adhere to them. When you're working, don't let them distract you. You can also set limits on your distraction time so you don't fall into another level deep in procrastination. Remember that any activity can be productive if it is done with the right attitude.

Tips to stop procrastinating

Procrastination can have many negative consequences if it is not addressed. By delaying your duties, you put your future at risk, limiting your chances of achieving your goals. Your career can be affected if you submit work below the expected standard. The competition is fierce.

Now that we know what procrastination can lead to, let's see how to beat it.

The key is to make your goals attainable and set a manageable schedule for your tasks. It also helps to determine a work routine, with specific hours and develop a disciplined method for your professional activity.

Let's say you have an assignment that is due in five weeks. If your goal is to finish it in a week because you want to spend time at the beach with the family later, you probably won't get it. But if you set more manageable goals for yourself throughout the month, like completing one section of the task each week, it won't be as difficult and you'll find it much easier to finish it on time.

Procrastinate when you are a freelancer.

Freelancers cannot afford to procrastinate too much. In a job for someone else either, but it can be more hidden. We all know the typical joke about officials who deliberately

lengthen the preliminaries of the tasks and eternalize the efforts. When the business depends only on you and your performance, you cannot afford to waste time, since the success of your business depends on that performance being effective. Furthermore, as I said in a previous paragraph, the competition is fierce and anyone else can turn up to do the job better than you and in less time, simply because they have found a way to optimize their time.

Procrastinating is not worth it.

As you can see, procrastinating is not worth it. It doesn't matter if you're nervous about starting a big project or just not sure how to approach it. If you keep procrastinating, the projects will pile up and end up being too many to handle in a reasonable amount of time. Even if you are able to stay up all night and complete projects at the last minute, this strategy will cause you stress and exhaustion, two things that will affect your ability to perform well.

As the saying goes, "Don't put off until tomorrow what you can do today." Procrastination causes more problems than it solves. So don't wait for tomorrow to start what you have to do today.