Whether it’s in your professional or personal life, procrastination can negatively impact your success. It’s important to start practicing some easy methods right away if you frequently procrastinate. The following tips can help you stop procrastinating right now.
1. Understanding Why You Procrastinate
You may have to postpone a task briefly since your work calendar for the day is full. If you pick up the task the next day, it’s not procrastination. However, if you’re indefinitely delaying crucial tasks or filling up your to-do list with non-productive works, then it’s a solid indication that you’re procrastinating.
Now, you need to find the root cause to stop procrastination. The reasons could be:
- The task is awful and dull.
- You’re not using task organization methods like to-do lists or scheduling.
- You’re not confident that you could complete the task or concerned about failures.
- If you’re a perfectionist, then you could procrastinate to achieve lawlessness.
2. Visualize Your Future Goals
If you start to imagine where you want to see yourself in the next three to five years, you’ll be able to motivate yourself quickly. If you plan to accumulate some serious wealth in the near future, jump-start the ongoing projects and meet deadlines. Seek more projects from new sources, and thereby you can charge yourself to avoid procrastination.
3. Get Rid of Distractions on the Path to Success
Digital gadgets, entertainment websites, news apps, social media platforms, addictive games, etc., are the distractions that force you to procrastinate.
So, create a solid plan to destroy such distractions to achieve your life goals. Use a free calendar app to define when and for how long you can do the followings activities:
- Using mobile phones and other smart digital gadgets.
- Visiting entertainment platforms.
- Social media website interactions.
4. Take a Break or Time-Off
On a weekday, if you’re working for long, you’ll become overwhelmed. When you feel devastated by endless tasks, you’ll start delaying project work. To avoid this, take short breaks at regular intervals and come back to work after 10 to 15 minutes. Taking short breaks will keep your mind relaxed and focused on the task.
Similarly, if you’ve worked hard for many days to complete a project, you can take a planned time off to refresh your thought process. Start a new project with solid focus after you come back from your vacation.
5. Meet a Motivating Mentor or Friend
You need to regularly interact with your friends, team members, and colleagues who inspire you through their professional and personal achievements.
Whether you’re running a freelance gig or working in an organization, make sure to consider the following:
- Attend all project-oriented meetings to keep yourself up to date.
- Strictly avoid non-productive interactions with friends on weekdays.
- Attend virtual conferences or webinars of motivating leaderships from big companies.
6. Take Control of Your Energy
Despite creating an elaborate to-do list and keeping distractions at bay, you can’t work on multiple tasks with the same energy level throughout the day. Smart and highly disciplined professionals know when they’re in peak productive hours and less productive hours.
When you feel supercharged, try to accomplish as many tasks as you can. As your productive mood burns out, stop working and take a rest. Finish non-project tasks or chores during this time. When you again feel like being productive, resume the postponed task.
7. Get Started on a Task Right Away
You need to push yourself to get started with the new project. It’s often the most challenging part when you plan to stay away from procrastination.
Once you force yourself to begin a task, you’ll be motivated to accomplish subsequent tasks. After successfully closing a small but important task, you can feel motivated to take on a larger task.
8. Don’t Stress About Failure or Success
Most professionals hold back on completing crucial tasks due to fear of success or failure. Sometimes, you may fail while carrying out duties, but that shouldn’t stop you from starting over again.
Even though you may feel sad, you can always learn from your failures and be confident that next time will be different. If you fail frequently, you will learn more, and soon you will become an expert.
Fear of success is another driving factor behind procrastination. As you become more productive, you may worry that your supervisor will assign you more responsibilities.
It’s true in some cases, but you’ll also get the chance to do more beneficial tasks. Your chances of career growth will increase as you become the go-to person for your managers.
9. Invest in Upskilling
You can start procrastinating if your skill set is high for a certain task because you’ll not feel the challenge to charge yourself. Similarly, if you lack a specific skill set to complete a project, then you’ll start procrastinating out of fear and anxiety.
You need to invest more time in learning new skills through online mentoring programs. Opt for a challenging task and apply your learnings to accomplish the work. Such a smart approach will keep you away from procrastinating.
10. Improve Your Lifestyle for More Energy
Procrastination occurs when you lack energy during the weekdays. Follow these practical tips to improve your daily habits:
- Get high-quality sleep for up to 8 hours.
- Create a healthy diet plan that’ll include sufficient vitamins, proteins, minerals, and water. Consume minimum carbohydrates and avoid fat at all costs.
- Eat small-sized meals throughout the day and avoid overeating in the afternoons and evenings.
- Exercise for an hour each day to maintain physical stamina.
- Stay away from addictive food and drugs.
11. Setup a Productive Work Environment
The workspace setup is crucial in maintaining productivity momentum and avoiding procrastination. You can try the following ideas:
- Your workspace shouldn’t have any distractions like people moving around, loud music, television, etc.
- Keep your workspace decluttered to feel motivated during work.
- The workplace setup shouldn’t make you feel sleepy.
Keep Project Deadlines on Track
These 11 ideas will help you overcome procrastination and meet the project goals according to the client’s schedule. You can also automate some of the task management parts with free online apps to become more productive.