Have you been putting something off that you know you want to get done? Have you ever found yourself wondering why you haven’t reached the success that you want for your health, or why your life isn’t how you have imagined it?
At the root of what stops many of us women from achieving our goals and reaching success is procrastination disguised as overextending ourselves, allowing distractions and believing in our fears.
“Procrastination is one of the most common and deadliest of diseases and its toll on success and happiness is heavy.” ~ Wayne Gretsky
These are 3 hidden ways procrastination shows up which leads to putting off what is most important to you including your health.
I’ve put together some of my best coaching tips and strategies to help you overcome these hidden ways of procrastination so that you have more energy and accomplish your important goals and feel confident and motivated.
1) Overextending Yourself
It’s important that you don’t try to accomplish too many goals at the same time, because if you do, procrastination on accomplishing some of them will come from simple exhaustion. You can probably find the time to accomplish two or three goals at the same time, depending upon what kind of goals they are and the work that goes into them.
Some goals you may have to do by themselves, and any more than two or three goals usually means that you not only don’t have enough time to accomplish your weekly goals, it also means that you’re exhausted about halfway through the week. Make sure that your procrastination doesn’t come from having too many goals at once, and if that is the case, just remove one or two of them to complete at a later date.
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2) Allowing Distractions
Distractions are all around us. Most of us have technology distractions with our phones, Facebook, Twitter and Email. We also have our spouse, our children, our extended family members, all who want a piece of our time, plus our friends want to see us once in a while. Add to all that the 40-50 hours per week that you spend at work and it’s easy to see why we don’t have time to achieve our goals – or at least why we think we don’t have the time which leads to procrastinating.
So, how do you solve these problems?
The best way is by making your goals a priority.
If you knew that if you don’t pay that traffic ticket by the end of the week, the fine would double, you’ll probably find the time to pay it, would’n’t you? Even if you have to go down to the courthouse and stand in line for two hours to pay the ticket, you would still find the time to pay it somehow.
Your goals need to be even a higher priority. While you may not always be able to work on them at the same time every day or week, it’s important to make progress to reach them.
As a coach what I recommend is to make a weekly checklist of what you want to do to achieve that week’s goals and hang it somewhere where you’ll have to walk past it often. As you complete each item, check it off and make sure that everything is checked by the end of the week.
3) Believing in Your Fears
Fear can hold us back from achieving our goals. Fear doesn’t just manifest itself once and then disappear either. It usually comes in a vicious cycle that keeps you from success.
When you start having fears you start to doubt yourself and change your mind about your goals.
The fear isn’t going to go away and the best way to deal with it is simply to acknowledge the fear and be honest with yourself. You know that the lies that your fears are trying to tell you are just that – lies. And you choose to believe them so you delay and procrastinate and put things off that are important.
This is not meant to make you feel bad – it’s all part of our life experiences and all of us do it. What’s important is to look past those fears when they come up and truly ask yourself if any of the things that the fears are telling you are likely to be true. Then remind yourself of why your goal is important to you and take the next step towards it.
I have a special gift for you that will help you with overcoming procrastination and sticking to your goals.
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Affirm to yourself:
“I think positively, take responsibility for my actions and create my future.”
No Excuse Action Step:
Pick one of the 3 hidden ways procrastination shows up in your life and follow the coaching tip for the next week.
Remember, I am here for you, to support and believe in you.
I would love to hear about how procrastination shows up for you. Please post below.
Thanks for commenting, liking or sharing this post.
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Lisa Hutchison
5 Aug 2015I often use the technique of focusing on 1-3 main goals. If that is too overwhelming I look at what is one thing I can do within that goal toady, usually I end up doing more. :) Any type of progress is good, small steps are still steps. Thanks Josee for your blog.
Natasha Botkin
5 Aug 2015Lovely sharing! Even though #3 is fading away for me, it’s wonderful to have one more tool in toolbag. Thanks!
Andrea
5 Aug 2015Hmmm… overextending as a form of procrastination? Yep. I’m working on it. Thanks for a great reminder.
Tae
5 Aug 2015I’ve gotten good at #1, but still struggle with #2. I LOVE the traffic ticket analogy! Thanks for that…good to keep in mind. And yes, I admit I still have a tendency to let fear stop me in my tracks. I’ve started talking to it “Hello fear, I hear you & recognize what you are trying to tell me. I got this; you can take a rest now.” It really helps when I recognize it & then move on!
Reba Linker
6 Aug 2015Wonderful reminder to move past our fears and get on with our dreams! xox, Reba
Pamela
7 Oct 2015Great post Josee! Three powerful ways to recognize where procrastination is sticking us. Thank you!
Howie
8 Oct 2016Agree,
I purposely sign up 7 courses, to over extended my self.
Now, I am adding one hour a day or two each day to fill my schedule, so I can have a full time assignment.
In order to do that 8 eliminate Mt other distracting habits, such as watch tv, watch Facebook and other social media.
It works
Kelley Grimes
7 Oct 2015This is such an insightful and important article for me to read today? I really appreciate understanding that my overextending could be part of my procrastination and will explore this new awareness. Thank you so much!