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Are you a time waster? Does your productivity suck?
Do you often put off to tomorrow that which you should have done last year!
You have just watched the typical symptoms, excuses and alibis, of time wasting or, to give it it’s proper name, procrastination.
Procrastination kills productivity and any ambition ever aimed for. It relegates people to the under achievers and failures in our society. They avoid the tasks and choices that need to be taken, so end up achieving nothing.
Even the most talented amongst us will be relegated to failure if afflicted with procrastination and indecision. Unfortunately it’s all too common, indeed, most of us suffer from it from time to time, to varying degrees.
So I want to help people to avoid the time wasting pitfalls, and to increase their productivity and success, by offering my 7 tips to avoiding time wasting…
One of the biggest factors to procrastination is fear…fear of failure, or fear of crticism. Face your fears and remember that you will only face criticism if you fail to complete the task in hand. Break the task down into bite-sized chunks that are easily completed.
Avoid multitasking at all costs…for if you focus on one thing you will enjoy a pure experience. As Confucious says, “He who chases two rabbits catches neither.” Multitasking waters down your efforts, lowers your I.Q., causes panic and shifting of priorities, so do one thing well then move on to the next task.
F ocus on what you want to achieve…instead of on what you want to avoid. Concentrate on the required outcome and not on the worst case scenario for this takes you back into a state of fear. Avoid distractions – remain focused on what will achieve the desired outcome.
You cannot manage time…you must manage yourself by organization and planning. Narrow down the choices you must make, then breakdown the tasks into prioritized manageable chunks. Don’t waste 80-percent of the day on something that delivers only 20-percent of the desired outcome.
Changing your system to avoid the symptom…is fundamental to eliminating procrastination. Recognize your talents and strengths then structure your life around them and you will become the best of you. To defeat procrastination you must evaluate your actions and emotions to determine why it is a problem.
Don’t allow distractions…because it takes 20 minutes to return to the place where you were before the distraction. Three distractions in a morning and you’ve lost a quarter of the mornings production time. When you begin to lose focus, you can find a stray thought causing the mind to runaway in the totally wrong direction. Take a break when this happens then return with a fresh mind and complete focus.
Eliminate the 4 cardinal sins of procrastination…distraction, interruption, indicision, and friction.
- Focus on the task in hand and don’t allow your thoughts to wander.
- New email is one of the worst distractions, turn off the email alert so new mail makes no sound.
- To make a bold or quick decision based on your plan, is better than to never make a decision at all.
- Emotional baggage, perhaps from a disagreement or traffic incident, will prevent your mind from functioning efficiently.
I’ll stop procrastinating tomorrow is not an option if you need to increase your productivity. Develop a mantra like ‘Do it now’, or ‘Let’s get on’.
Whenever you realize you’re losing your focus, take a break, then return with a ‘Clean Focus’. The key to beating procrastination is firstly recognizing that you sometimes suffer from it, and secondly training the mind to eliminate it. 
Sincerely,
P.S. If you suffer even just a little, take a look at my free stop procrastination report to help you increase your personal productivity.
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