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Procrastination, the culprit behind most of our failures and disappointments.
Its when cleaning your room is more enticing than writing your school paper, then realizing
you need to read more resources because ten articles aren't enough.
Or when you finally have the time to read that book you've bought a year ago, then you
thought "would it be nice if these books are arranged alphabetically?
Then randomly grabbing a dumbbell and working out your biceps instead of finishing your
homework, because at the moment a pumped up arm is more important.
We are attracted to Instant Gratification.
One of the most pervasive and best examples of procrastination is when you are tasked
to complete a school paper.
You've been given four weeks to finish it but you cant seem to push your self to even
start an outline.
As the deadline approaches you haven't started anything because your mind just doesn't cooperate,
and instead you avoid it by doing unrelated tasks.
Eventually the deadline is a day away and you start to panic and that's only time when
your brain start to cooperate.
Years ago when I was procrastinating, avoiding my essay by looking for interesting reads
I've come across Wait But Why, ab blog by Tim Urban, a self confessed procrastinator
who came up the best explanation on the mechanics of procrastination.
The mind of a chronic procrastinator works like this, the rational decision maker, or
you, at least your ideal self is the captain of the ship, the steering wheel is firmly
gripped by your hands and your destination is your task.
But beside you there's a companion called the Instant gratification monkey.
He is spontaneous and he likes leisure and random fun activities and his mission is to
steer you away from your plans and to go to a place called the Dark Playground.
This is a place you end up when the Instant Gratification Monkey is in-charge, its a dark
place of guilt and anxiety because of unearned leisure, brought by bizarre and weird activities.
Tim Burton listed feelings and activities that are so relatable its funny and depressing,
such as watching documentaries in Youtube, checking the fridge every ten minutes, stalking
Facebook friends, and then having a depressing nap.
But the Instant gratification monkey has one big fear and that is the Panic Monster.
The Panic Monster wakes up when the deadline is dangerously close.
Here you start cramming and forcing your brain to focus and generate ideas.
Yes you will finish it and you'll be proud of yourself but you are not fooling anyone
by the quality of your output.Procrastination and Deadlines.
A study in 2001 conducted by Kalus Wertenbroch and Dan Ariely explains how procrastination
and deadlines are intertwined.
They set up three classes and each had three weeks to finish three papers.
Class A had to submit all three papers on the last day of class, Class B were given
the choice to choose three separate deadlines for each papers but had to stick to the schedule,
and Class C had to submit one paper per week.
Which do you think did the best?
Class A who had the most time for all three papers did the worst, Class B who chose three
deadlines in advance but had to commit to them did second best, and Class C who had
to pass one paper per week did the best.
How did this happen When class A had the most freedom.
Class A had no systematic deadline for all papers so they put off everything until the
last week.
Class B knew they would procrastinate so they spread out their deadlines.
Class C were forced to follow a deadline so most were able to focus on each paper.
How did this happen?
Students in Class A overestimated themselves and failed to recognize their tendency to
procrastinate.
They thought they were at advantage because they had the freedom of choosing a deadline
for all three papers.
When you don't realize or accept your tendency to put off tasks you tend to do it all near
the deadline.
Present Bias.
It's December 31st and you are one day away from a restart.
Finally life has given you another chance change your destiny.
You purchase a planner or simply print out a sharp looking to do list from Pinterest.
You fill it out with all life changing goals such as starting a Keto diet, reading a book
per month, and starting a draft of your novel.
Its gonna be your year.
Fast forward to twelve months, you've lost a couple pounds, read a book or two, and youve
finished your novel's character sketch.
Nothing much has changed, you're still exactly the same you a year ago.
What happened between those written goals and desired results?
You've might have bought vegetables and fruits but along the way you were tempted to cheat
here and there then eventually you lost motivation to stick to it.
Maybe you've read a book or two but you've wasted free time in mentally easy but gratifying
tasks like looking at memes and reading snippets of information online.
Problem is you've over estimated your future self when you were writing down your plans.
This is called present bias, its when you overvalue immediate rewards at the expense
of long term pay offs.
You see, losing weight doesn't happen overnight, the real life pay off from gaining knowledge
and wisdom from books doesn't arrive immediately, and seeing structure in your novel certainly
will take months or even years.
But eating chocolates, scrolling down posts on social media, skipping gym day are instantly
gratifying, especially not doing anything by sleeping.
Present Bias could also affect bigger parts of your life such as unprotected sex, delays
that are career damaging, and not going to the doctor's appointment.
You cant blame yourself in being susceptible to this mental flaw because our ancestors
survived this way.
They weren't used to seeing their grandchildren grow, let alone see them born.
Life expectancy was short and their brains didn't evolve to long term planning.
Hyperbolic Discounting.
Present Bias is also like Hyperbolic Discounting, it's when we prefer smaller payoffs now over
larger payoffs later.
If I offer you 10$ now or 50$ next year, which would you take?
I'm sure you would choose 10% because you can enjoy it now, after all who knows what
will happen next year, its a blurry realm of unpredictability.
The farther the pay off is-in the future, even its a greater one, the less it becomes
enticing.
Having a clean room seems better than submitting your school papers at the last day of the
class.
Or a bookshelf arranged by genre may seem preferable at the moment than having a job
in a month.
Hyperbolic discounting is a type of procrastination where we throw all our tasks into, in hopes
somehow figuring how to accomplish them, whether by finding the right time or having the mental
capability to do it.
So what will I do with this information?
The key in beating procrastination is outsmarting your brain.
Research shows the pleasure seeking part of ours brain lights up when presented with instant
gratification things.
In the late 60's Walter Mischel conducted an experiment in Stanford University about
self control.
In the experiment each child was presented with a marshmallow.
The children were told if they could wait a while and not eat it they would get a second
treat.
If they didn't want to wait, they can ring the bell but they will only get one marshmallow.
The kids who were willing to wait for a second treat realized they couldn't just stare at
the marshmallow and not eat it, so what they did was distract themselves by looking away
or tapping their feet.
Others as per instruction by researchers, mentally re-framed the marshmallow into pictures,
making the temptation less immediate.
Walter followed the children later in their lives and he found out those who knew how
to cope with temptation did better in life, scored more in SAT's, earned more money, and
were healthier and happier.
In procrastination, the key is recognizing your brain is susceptible to instant gratification
but you can develop strategies to outsmart it.
There are simple ways to force you to focus on tasks such as disabling the internet in
your computer or pulling the plug in our router.
Programs like Freedom disable your internet for a certain period of time to combat online
distraction.
In losing weight, subscribing to dietary programs such as Nutrisystem will force you to follow
a strict meal plan.
In fitness, a personal gym instructor will push you to go to the gym and will assure
you stick to a workout program.
The key to winning against procrastination is beating it before it even emerges, or a
gameplan when it comes.
It is a battle against a future you, because now you may be motivated but the other you
in the future will be your enemy.