Keep Calm and Procrastinate

No one is unaware of the horror of procrastination. Since early on in your life when you only studied at the last few days/hours before exams to putting off reading that novel you promised to read at your book club or even as small a thing as getting up early to go for a jog/walk.

Not wanting to do certain activities due to one reason or the other is a normal thing. I’m all too familiar myself with the constant back-and-forth, the mental pros/cons list running in your head, the nagging question in the back of your head all day long — it’s not a fun place to be.

I have a friend, let’s call her Parul; a few months back she was really unhappy at her job. She kept telling me that she would soon quit, but kept putting it off each day. This constant indecisiveness was making her feel reactive and totally out of control, which was then causing her to pile on the self-judgment. She kept hating on herself and complaining about how awful it felt to be constantly on the fence.

One day I sat down with her at a cafe and let her know what I felt about her situation. I told her that her not making a choice whether to quit or stay is still a choice at the end of the day.

Not making a decision is a Decision

What she told me about her indecisiveness made me feel like many women must be feeling this way right now or must have felt at some point in their lives:-

• Not feeling motivated
• Not knowing when’s the “right time” to make the move
• A pessimistic attitude around her as well as within her
• What comes after/What will happen to me

Sounds familiar?

So finally we thought of a solution to her problem. We decided that every morning when she wakes up, she will ask herself if she’s going to work or give in her final notice that day and whatever she decides to do on that day will remain unquestioned. This will happen again the next morning. It will help her in making a decision for the day and then forget about that problem and focus on other important things. The key; she won’t be allowed to judge herself after she makes any decision that she chooses to make for the day.

We all will be faced to make a tough decision in our lives at one point or the other.

Be it your job, your school, your family or your relationships. Decisions will have to be made every now and then.

So what I want you to try is make that decision each morning and then stick with it. The beauty of it, if things don’t turn out right that day, you can always do it over the next day. Only rule of this is; once a decision is made you are not allowed to judge it. Be confident in your choice, only if for a day.

Here’s why this is such a powerful daily practice:

• You’re back in the driver’s seat of your life.
• You can’t blame your situation on anyone or anything else, because you made a conscious decision.
• You avoid that disgusting, out-of-control reactive feeling.
• You only have to make the best decision for today. You can trust your future self to make the best decision for tomorrow, next week, or next month (your future self has more info & experience and is smarter than you are, anyway).

So, who’s going to take on this challenge with me?