October 9, 2019

Procrastinator Kryptonite: Don’t let what you can’t do, stop you from doing what you can do

As someone who suffers from periodic bouts of procrastination, I am always looking for a way to trick myself into getting started sooner. When I find myself putting off doing something, I often turn to the wise words of John Wooden…

Don’t let what you can’t do, stop you from doing what you can do.
John Wooden

Why I procrastinate…

This resonates deeply with me because it eliminates my go to excuse for procrastinating: an underlying belief that I can’t do something. Yep, it is that same ole irrational fear of failure disguised as an optimistic long-shot belief that delaying the task will somehow yield better results.

When there is a hill to climb, waiting won’t make it smaller.
Unknown

What it really boils down to is avoiding the pain, embarrassment, or stress that comes with failure or rejection. One of the leaders I had the great fortunate to work and learn from, helped me realize this. As a leader, she was always mindful of what her team enjoyed doing and what they were really good at. She often said that people prioritize two things: (1) What they enjoy and (2) What they are good at. Thus, the reverse is definitely true when it comes to procrastinating: People will give lower priority and delay doing: (1) What they don’t enjoy and (2) What they are bad at.

Despite knowing better, I sometimes fall into this trap. Especially, when it comes to writing for my blog. While I enjoy writing, I’m not confident that I am that I’m good at it. This is my double edged sword, because I will only get better by writing more. Herein lies my procrastination dilemma and also what brings me back to the words of John Wooden, “Don’t let what you can’t do stop you from doing what you can do.”

The trouble is hard to stop all the negative self-talk when we don’t know how to do something. This is how we convince ourself to delay. This makes it really easy to convince ourselves that we need to wait for the right time of day or until we have all the right equipment to get started. That’s why I have to trick myself into just doing something.

How to Trick Yourself into Getting Started

It’s a little of a Jedi mind trick, but on the tasks I don’t enjoy or lack the skill I think I need I start by doing a practice run. This give me a preview of the task to make sure I have full understanding what it will actually take to get it done. I look for the easiest thing to do first and to create a plan to do the task in small doable parts.

For example, I am in the midst of applying to schools for my younger son and it’s not something I enjoy doing. Waiting to the last minute is a rookie mistake that I made last year, so today I decided to start by reviewing the school application to figure out everything I needed to do and to find the quickest and easiest parts to complete. After reviewing the application I realized that there were plenty of quick parts that I could complete today. I also realized I could copy and paste from previous school applications. Once I got started, I was on a roll and ended up finishing the first part of application. The great thing about getting started early, was I knew what’s left to complete. That meant I could split some of the tasks with my husband. It’s much harder to get help or delegate when you have waited until the last minute to do something. That’s the power of just getting started. You usually get more done than expected and if you’re lucky, you realize that the task isn’t as hard as you think. So in the case of procrastination, kryptonite is just doing something. Don’t let what you can’t do stop you. There is always something that you can do. That’s my tiny victory when it comes to procrastination.