The Most Common Reason People Procrastinate and How to Overcome Procrastination
by www.Sedona.com
Admit it. There’s something that you should be doing right now. And you’ve been “meaning to do it” for some time now, but just can’t seem to muster up the motivation. It’s called procrastinating, and this ugly little tendency is all too common among Americans.
In fact, while only 5 percent of us considered ourselves procrastinators in 1978, in 2007 26 percent of us said we procrastinated regularly, according to a study by University of Calgary professor Piers Steel. Further:
- Men are more likely to procrastinate than women
- Young people are more likely to procrastinate than older people
- Three out of four college students say they procrastinate
According to the study, “strong and consistent predictors of procrastination were task aversiveness, task delay, self-efficacy, and impulsiveness, as well as conscientiousness and its facets of self-control, distractibility, organization, and achievement motivation.”
In other words, this “prevalent and pernicious form of self-regulatory failure,” as it’s described in the study, is largely the result of, you guessed it, too many distractions.
“At work, e-mail, the Internet and games are just a click away, making procrastination effortless,” Steel said in a Fox News article.
"That stupid game Minesweeper -- that probably has cost billions of dollars for the whole society," he said.
What’s wrong with “putting off until tomorrow what could be done today”? According to Steel, "People who procrastinate tend to be less healthy, less wealthy and less happy.”
Overcoming Procrastination for Good
Most everyone would agree that procrastination does not feel good in the long-run, because it simply drags out that nagging, dreading feeling you have about a certain project or task. Eventually, you know you will end up doing it, so logically it makes sense to get it over and done with as soon as possible, therefore ending your suffering and allowing you to have some time to play without worries.
Of course, most of us don’t follow logic because we are controlled by our emotions. And in this case, the emotion that controls us is resistance.
“The main cause for procrastination is simply resistance to the project that is being put off,” says Hale Dwoskin, CEO and director of training of Sedona Training Associates. “You resist a task, put it off and then still have it as an ongoing burden, which generates more of the feeling of resistance.”
“If you allow yourself to let go of the resistance you will find yourself doing even long put off tasks with ease. Resistance is just a feeling and can be let go of if you decide to just drop it,” Dwoskin says.
If you would like to learn how to let go of the resistance you feel about your most put-off projects, The Sedona Method is an excellent place to start. By answering just three simple questions, it will show you how to release resistance so that you can finally tackle your projects (and your underlying procrastination).
Ultimately, the more you release the more you will realize that you were putting more effort into procrastinating than it takes to actually complete even your most “dreaded” tasks.
Sources
Psychological Bulletin. 2007 Jan Vol 133(1) 65-94
FoxNews.com January 11, 2007
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