The deadline is coming… But instead of doing your work, you choose to be busy with your phone, checking your social media, and watching video. Deep inside, you know that you feel guilty to be not productive, but you’re just feel lazy to do anything. This phenomenon is what we called by procrastinating. If you’re struggling to stop procrastinating, this article is for you!
Most of the procrastinator will blame that they are unable to finish the task just because they’re too busy. Apparently, the procrastinator is just waste most of their free time to do something not productive.
Delaying, run away from task is a really bad habit than can ruin your goals. It can affect you to achieve a better result of your life.
Don’t let procrastinate take away your goals and future. I was a procrastinator previously until I found these tricks that really helped me to get rid of this habit. So here are the 10 guides to stop procrastinating that will change your life entirely:
1. Reward & Consequence
There are two ways to motivate a person, through consequences or reward.
If you choose consequence:
Spend a moment to deeply think of what is the consequence of procrastinating. By procrastinating, you will tend to do the job last minute which result in not satisfying or good outcome. If the real consequence is not scared you enough, you can set your own consequence of what punishment you will get if you can’t finish it on time.
If you choose reward:
If there is a good reward for your hardworking, you won’t be procrastinating. However, I know that mostly the possible reward that you can get is not enough to motivate you. Here is where you need to set your self-reward once you finished with your job.
2. Change Environment
When you feel that you always procrastinate when doing work from home, try to change your workplace and you will be shocked of how the environment can strongly affect your productivity.
However, every human has their own preferred environment to stimulate their productivity.
Type A: For some people, they need to work in an environment that everyone else also work in order to stimulate their brain productivity. If they work at home, they tend to be sleepy or procrastinate a lot. Perfect place for type A to work could be library, co-working space, or a cafe.
Type B: This is the people that are actually already have a high self discipline. They prefer a silent place to be fully productive. Perfect place for type B will be their own room while nobody can disturb them.
3. Hang Out With Productive People
If your circle friend is a group of lazy people who loves to procrastinate or waste most of their time on unproductive things, you might wanna find a new friends. You don’t have to unfriend these “lazy” people, but you can spend less time with them and hang out with a new friend that you know has a good and hardworking spirit.
The people you hang out with can affect your spirit and mindset. If you hang out with friends that have a good discipline and spirit, soon you will get the same spirit too!
4. Stop Over Complicated Things
“I will start do it tomorrow because of A,B,…..,Z”. If you have this habit, you need to stop it right away. If you keep delaying things, you won’t accomplish anything at all.
When you really want to stop procrastinating, what you need to think is “Just do it”. Most of the people out there is just complaining about their life but still have not take action on anything!
5. Set a Detailed Deadline of Every Goal
When you have a project or assignment to do, break it down to several parts and set a deadline for every parts.
For example when you’re doing a thesis, set a deadline for every sub-chapter and of course, you need to do a research on how long does it take to complete each chapter. Set the deadline few days earlier so that you have time to fix if there is any error.
6. Make a Bet With Your Friend
Tell your buddy if you can’t finish your task or achieve your goal by certain deadline, you will pay him some money. The higher the money you set, the lower chance you will procrastinate as you don’t want to lose your money.
7. Set a Timer and Commit For a Few Hours
For instance, if you decided to spend 4 hours a day on your assignment, set a timer for 1-2 hours and within this duration, you must commit to don’t touch your phone at all. You can have a 15 minutes break every 1 or 2 hours with your phone.
8. Use Your Greatest Fear and Imagine It
I’ve got this idea when I woke up from a terrible dream. That time, I was in the middle of doing one of the assignment. In my dream, one of my friend remind me that the due date is by tomorrow morning. I was so shocked because I just started to do my assignment and it really impossible to finish it within a day. I couldn’t think anything else other than doing my assignment. After woke up from that dream, I felt so grateful that it was just a dream and it boosted my motivation.
Afterwards, I got the idea of applying this trick to reach my own goals. I try to trick my mind that tomorrow is the deadline. In a critical situation like this, nothing can distract me from being focus to do my work.
9. Eliminate All Possible Distraction
Get rid all the gadgets that can possibly distract you from your task, such as phone, tablet, etc.
Ask your friends or family member to help you. Tell this idea to them to keep your phone within 1 or 2 hours and don’t give it to you within that period.
10. Make a Good Habit
All the tricks above is just for temporary. If you want to stop procrastinating forever, all you need to do is make it as your routine. By doing it as your routine, it will soon become a habit that will change your life. Try to be consistent of doing this for a month and you will shock that your old habit of procrastinating is just gone!
Bottom Line
In order to stop procrastinating, you also need a strong determination from yourself.
