I have untold amounts of practice procrastinating. In fact, I’m writing this post (which as been a draft for about a year) as I procrastinate on something else—a lot of something elses, to be frank.

It feels nice keeping my skills up-to-date.

Don’t you ever wonder that if you quit practicing your procrastination you might forget how to procrastinate?

That was a tongue twister, wasn’t it? Whew. I had trouble reading that back through…

This is where I get serious. Because the answer to that question is “yes.”

I’m not going to make this into a long article, so I’ll say only one more thing. Think about it. If you just start practicing not procrastinating one day, and practice a little every day, pretty soon, you won’t be procrastinating nearly as often.

So call it practice. I do. This was my daily practice to quit procrastinating. My next goal? Become a finisher.

Hey, you might could say I’ve been practicing that this morning too! I’ve finished this post.

Post from: Perpetual Procrastination

Expert Advice: Practice

Is National Procrastination Week supposed to be a time of leisure when we can feel good about putting things off, or is it a time when we’re supposed to bust out of our procrastinating ways and get our stuff done?

I’m not really sure about the answer yet, so I’ll give you a choice. Pick one and follow the instructions for a productive National Procrastination Week.

1. Let things go

Take the week off. Anything time sensitive should be delayed as long as possible. Maybe you’ll get lucky and someone else will do it for you.

2. Play catch up

Schedule every day with as many of those long put off tasks as you can remember and race the clock to get them done before the end of the week. Just think. If you finish even half of them, you’ll be halfway to done.

Post from: Perpetual Procrastination

National Procrastination Week

Maybe this is an exaggeration, then again, maybe not. Either way you look at it, if you can learn to shut off all the notifications of email and the auto checking functions, you’ll be that much closer to not having an instant procrastination pal. Take heed, so you don’t end up at the end of the day wondering just where the heck your day went.

Shut off all the email interruptions that could pull you away from what you are doing and send you spiraling out of control.

Also, don’t forget that if you set up specific times of day to check email, there’s really no need to have the auto check feature turned on. In fact, if you often find yourself needing to write emails throughout the day, you’ll likely be better off turning off the auto checking feature. Having emails come in whenever you open you email client up to write a simple email is a big distraction. Most people can’t resist skimming or even outright reading their new emails if they’re there, so take that temptation away by doing away with auto check.

I have auto checking turned off for every account I have in Thunderbird and it has worked wonders for me. I no longer find myself answering three or four unrelated emails every time I open the program. Because I limit my email checking, it also helps me avoid the back-and-forth that can come from constant email checking. If you need to collaborate with someone that badly, get on your instant messaging program and get it over with.

If you have people getting on your back because you aren’t responding immediately to their emails, remind them that email is not a phone call. If they need you that badly, they should call.

If you use Gmail or other online based email, DON’T make it your homepage in your browser. It’s easiest to fight temptation if you don’t put temptation right in your face.

Procrastination by email is a serious problem in these days of constant connectivity. I love my broadband connection, but ever since my rural telephone cooperative started offering DSL, checking email has become the bane of my existence, its lure like that of a shiny silver dollar in a wishing well. You know you shouldn’t want it, but boy is it hard to resist.

Take control. Don’t let email lead you astray.

Post from: Perpetual Procrastination

Your Email Auto Check is Not Your Friend

What does action oriented mean?

It means to be oriented toward, or focused on, action.

Do it, do it now. Don’t batch tasks for greater efficiency, and don’t put off something because there’s a better time for it. Just do it now. Take action whenever and wherever you can. You might suffer inefficiencies, but aren’t inefficiencies better than not doing it at all?

The truth is that procrastination is most prevalent when we put something off, because then we just want to put it off longer, later, and sometimes forever. By becoming action oriented and training ourselves to do things without even thinking about them first, we stop procrastination before it has time to take over.

And to me, that’s what becoming action oriented means.

Post from: Perpetual Procrastination

Become Action Oriented to Defeat Procrastination