Procrastination is not easy to fight once it has become your bad habit. The loop of postponing gets constant, ruining your schedules and exhausting you badly. Luckily, today you don’t have to survive on your willpower only. There are many special tools for self awareness, like mobile apps that help you understand your emotional and behavioral patterns better, as well as teach you to build useful habits. Let’s take a short walk through some techniques that have shown themselves to be effective.
Use journaling to name what you’re avoiding
Journaling can be a very powerful tool, no matter how exactly you use it. You can simply share your emotions or write down how your day went—this, too, will help free your mind and feel better. But if you try this technique, the results may be even better.
So, to use journaling in terms of overcoming procrastination, you will have to describe one thing you are avoiding. Write it down in as many details as possible, and then try to answer the question ‘why?’
The more details you put in it, the easier it will be for you to get to the root of the problem.
Some people like to use a real pen and paper, but you can easily analyze your habit of postponing things via apps. For example, the Liven app review states that this app can work great as a journaling tool, together with its AI-assistant that helps to analyze the problem even deeper.
Break the task into tiny steps and write them down
You have likely come across this approach multiple times already. And do you know why it is all over the Internet? Because it surely works!
Not only does it make the task appear manageable to your brain, but also makes you feel really productive when you cross these steps off your to-do list.
Besides, while breaking the big task down into smaller ones, you analyze it better and clarify the process for yourself. Which, in turn, helps you with better, thorough planning.
Use the “Two-minute mindful start”
If you find it hard to start your task (which is often where most people begin to procrastinate), make a small deal with yourself. Promise to work for two minutes only, and then decide whether you feel like going on. Only two minutes of clear, strong focus, no distractions or multitasking.
This plays a trick with your brain: once you have already started, it becomes much easier to continue. This might end up as a ritual for beginning—starting productively, without interruptions, and then checking up with yourself, scanning your feelings, mood, and bodily sensations.
Create a compassionate reframe
When procrastinating, you usually have one negative thought stopping you. Try to understand what this thought is, and then change it to a positive one. For example, if you want to start, but the idea ‘I can’t do it’ pops up in your head, reframe it to something compassionate and supportive, like ‘I’ll take baby steps and see if I can manage it.’
Being there for yourself is the best we can do when something feels unbearable. This way, you don’t only support yourself in the moment, but also start working on your thought patterns, which can grow into a great positive impact on your overall productivity in the future.
Check in with your body during work
How often do you think about your physical comfort during the day? Most of the work we do these days is intellectual, so we focus on getting things done without a clear understanding of our body cravings.
Make a pause once in a while to check how you feel. Are you thirsty? Do you need a short stretch for your legs that have fallen asleep after a long time sitting in your chair? Or maybe it has been hours since you used the restroom?
There is nobody who can know exactly what your body needs, except for you. So, don’t be too hard on yourself and give yourself some time to rewind.
Use mindful pauses throughout the day
We do a lot of things on autopilot, especially when we are in a rush and try to achieve a lot during our working hours. Our mind starts to feel overwhelmed, and the focus gets totally lost. So, to fight the urge to get distracted or try to multitask, it is much better to take pauses. Pay special attention to what you are doing during these breaks, and try switching from one task to another slowly. Say, do nothing for 10 seconds. No scrolling, no planning further actions—just a few moments of a totally clear mind.
You will shortly see how much better you will feel and notice how your productivity levels go up.
Celebrate tiny wins in your journal
There is a popular practice of gratitude that is widely used as a journaling prompt: every evening, people write down at least three things they are grateful for on this day.
You can take it further and highlight the most significant achievements. What has gone amazingly? What were you good at? These are the questions you can answer in your journal at the end of the day.
This way, you will get the recognition you deserve for your efforts and feel validated in what you do. On the days off or weekends, you can do it too, to see how much you actually do besides your job—in-house chores, hobbies, and human connections, because life is much more than just getting tasks done!
Summing up
Self-awareness can become a great complex of methods for overcoming procrastination, and you are free to use many of its tools that work best for you. The key is to stay mindful of what you do, feel, and think. This way, your daily actions can lead to stable positive results, taking the overthinking burden off your shoulders and letting you step into your best era.
