Overcoming Procrastination
How to Overcome Procrastination
Procrastination is the scourge of a lot of clients and people I meet at events and meetings. With “time management” and “work-life balance”, these represent the 3 most common reasons people come to me for help.
Procrastination is the act of delaying or putting off an activity, more often than not, until it’s too late to do. Waiting until the last minute to act can cause significant stress and anxiety which, in turn, can have serious consequences. Immunity has shown to be reduced, memory may be affected, the lack of focus can result in accidents and, if left un-managed, can lead to other mental illnesses such as depression.
A colleague of mine recently suggested the book “Eat That Frog” by Brian Tracy as a good read. Tracy is a world renowned author, speaker and someone I consider to be a guru of achievement. I have followed him for over 30 years and so I read through the book and it’s a beauty!! I had to share it with you.
So put simply….that’s my 1 easy step to solving procrastination issues – read the book “Eat That Frog”.
The inspiration for the title comes from Mark Twain who once said that if the first thing you do each morning is eat a live frog, you can go through the day with the satisfaction of knowing that that is probably the worst thing that is going to happen to you all day long.
So similarly, if the “frog” is your most important task and the one most likely you will try and put off, then doing that task first will have the greatest impact on your results.Brian Tracy suggests two rules:
1. If you have 2 frogs to eat, then eat the ugliest one first i.e. do the most important one first;
2. If you have to eat a frog at all, then it doesn’t pay to keep looking at it for a long time – so act quickly.
In the book Brian Tracy outlines 21 ways to help you stop procrastinating. I have prepared a brief précis of the 21 ideas which you can download here. Hopefully it will motivate you towards buying the book, reading it, and then applying what you learn from it.The most important advice I can give you – apart from buying the book – is to practice these every day and build some new habits and behaviours.
I look forward your feedback about the resource and particularly if you have been able to apply some of Brian Tracy’s ideas and gained some real benefits.