Give Up Procrastination

If you’ve been procrastinating about moving toward your goals, your time has just run out.  That’s right! Because I am giving you permission (not that you need it!) to embrace imperfection instead of trying to be perfect all the time, which the reason most of us procrastinate in the first place.

I’ll give you an example from my life.  I’m not a gym nut, but I know I need to exercise.  And, like you, I’m a busy person.  So it’s always been pretty easy to convince myself that until I had the time to get on a daily workout program, it just wasn’t worth getting started, because it’s better not to exercise at all than to do it half-heartedly, right?  Wrong!The truth is, exercising twenty minutes a day, three times a week, is a whole lot better than not exercising at all.  I was looking at my exercise program with an eye toward perfection, that is a five-day-a-week workout with a trainer, and I used that as my excuse.  Once I embraced imperfection and came to appreciate an imperfect exercise routine more than none at all, I started working out.  Twenty minutes, three days a week.  Occasionally, I even get in a full hour.  But if ten minutes is all I have, I’ll take it.  After all, this isn’t brain surgery, it’s a workout.  And, in this case, something really is better than nothing.

So why not join me in embracing imperfection and determine some activities on the “perfection priority scale” that don’t require as much time, energy or effort as you’ve been telling yourself?  That way, you can stop procrastinating and start taking action.  Here’s what I want you to do:

1. Make a list of five key projects you’re working on right now or that you’d like to start. Your list can include tasks or projects related to work, parenting, fitness, home or relationships.  Or anything else that’s meaningful to you.
2. Now prioritize these items on a 1-5 scale, with 1 applying to the item most worthy of striving for perfection, 5 the least.  How does that feel?  Was it hard to resist wanting everything to be perfect?  Or is it a relief that you could identify something as a 5 on your scale?
3. Next, make a list of the key items where you overemphasize, over-stress or over-strive for perfection more than the task really justifies.  Do you really care how organized your sock drawer is?  How neatly typed your phone list is?  How does your list of less important projects make you feel?  Is there anything you could cross off forever?
4. Now that you’ve discovered that not all tasks are created equal and not all of them require perfection – go take a break.  You’ve earned it!

This entry was posted on Monday, November 9th, 2009 at 1:58 pm and is filed under Featured, blog. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.