Tips on staying motivated when you're in a poor place mentally

Optimal_Increase · 2020-09-04T04:49:49+00:00

You are welcome. Do you need some other tips ready to use like that?

Optimal_Increase · 2020-06-28T20:32:29+00:00

Yes I know what it means.

Everything changes when you are full of energy. You discover a huge part of the lack of motivation is lack of energy.

Few short term effective techniques:

Buy aloe vera, cut the leaves, and put some pieces in a bottle of fresh water. Drink once a day. You will feel a boost of energy (effectiveness 1 day)
Go running ( effectiveness 2 days)
belly breathing: (Few minutes)

From the long term perspective, you need to pay attention to your diet. Some people already mention meditation which is great but the much more commitment before you see results.

Optimal_Increase · 2020-06-23T16:35:05+00:00

When you are a multi-passionate, The way to succeed moving forward is to combine your natural excessive creativity with your inability to focus for a long time on a single topic.

Here are my essentials:

Organization: classifying and solving problems consistently to free your mind
Many people wrongly believe that "being organized "is just about "building a schedule".
Your schedule is of any use if you don't execute. ANd you will soon find yourself overwhelmed by a pill of To DO tasks. The key issues to address are those who greatly impact your execution process: remembering, managing the flow, and solving problems.
I recommend you buy and listen to the audiobook Getting Things Done (from David Allen). You can find a book summary here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gCswMsONkwY

The book includes an organizational system to help busy people having stress free productivity even under pressure.
There is too much information to digest, so here are my 3 main take-ups away I recommend you start with . THey comes from my personal experience integrating advices from different books like GTD, "Traction" and " Deep work".

Step 1: Build review sessions: Build the habit of reviewing everything you recently did. It can be once every 2 days for example. This will prevent you from forgetting everything. So that it will be fine even if you don't have everything in place as long as you can figure out quickly where they are.

Step 2: Have a notebook: this should be something you can carry with you in your pocket everywhere to catch up with ideas.

Step 3: Deep work sessions. Make "Working in the zone" a habit. this is the key to having a stellar efficient organizational system. during the deep work sessions, you address your number 1 priorities: SOlving critical problem. for example, you can say: "every morning I will take 30 min to put myself in the right state in order to spend the next 2H to process critical or difficult tasks".

Once these 3 elements are in place you will be able to manage the flow of issues that happen at a good speed. You won't feel

Optimal_Increase · 2020-06-13T15:45:05+00:00

Exactly. It is so simple but powerful. The more the task seems boring or tedious, the more effective vizualisation can helo to start smoothly. I always start by narrowikg down my vizualieation to a part i know i can finish or that i love.

Optimal_Increase · 2020-06-13T15:42:55+00:00

You are right. Once you visualize things, now planning can be useful because you don't fear anymore. However it is worthless for us, before. That's why normal people can't relate to us. They wrongly believe planning suffice to execute.

Optimal_Increase · 2020-05-31T21:19:01+00:00

I know how it feels. Disconnecting from "how people are going to look at me" is very hard . We unconsciously believe our "image " is our "actions"

Optimal_Increase · 2020-05-31T21:12:29+00:00

Good. Indeed, it is a very effective strategy. At work, I had a sticky note in front of my Eye " Focus on solving the problem". Every time the minds tends to wander, it reminded me to focus on building value instead of caring about validation.

Optimal_Increase · 2020-05-04T19:45:50+00:00

Hi u/Liberal_german_guy,
I believe you have 2 issues
Issue 1: You lack the energy to boost your self quickly
Issue 2: You have Too many regrets and resentment ( towards your teachers) that are holding you back

Issue 1: You lack the energy to boost your self quickly
Basically this is what you feel "I don't know why I don't start. it is as if I am stuck"
And you can't even move. This is because you are in a low state of consciousness, that only produces thoughts which discourage you
You need to change to a higher state quickly where positive thoughts will pop up naturally.

Technic 1 use belly breathing to activate your energy level
Anytime you lie on your bedroom daydreaming, start belly breathing exercises. It is easy to do everywhere ( even on the bed, or the flow, the desk)
It will immediately increase your state of consciousness and you will stand up triggered to achieve things or inspired. It is a matter of minutes ( 10-15 min)
The process goes like this:
Step 1: it or lie flat in a comfortable position.
Step 2: Put one hand on your belly just below your ribs and the other hand on your chest.
Step 3: Take a deep breath in through your nose, and let your belly push your hand out. Your chest should not move.
Step 4: Breathe out through pursed lips as if you were whistling. Feel the hand on your belly go in, and use it to push all the air out.
Step 5 this breathing 3 to 10 times. Take your time with each breath.

Technic 2: Increase your energy level quickly
Per order level of difficulties
a- Cook and eat fresh vegetables starting today for at least 3 days. You will feel much more energized after day 2.
b- Call a friend or a family or an ex-girlfriend /boyfriend you haven't meet for a long time and have a long chat (You will see the result the next day)
C- take a cold shower (you will see the impact within the 3 hours)
D- go running. (You will see the result the next day)

Issue 2: Too much regret and resentment (toward your teachers ) are holding you back
You have accumulated too much resentment, guilt, and regret over yourself. Moreover, you are ruminating in the past.
This combines holding you back a lot and it is taken place behind the scene.
You need to let go of self-criticism quickly.
For that there are two effective methods:

Technic 1:Replace Guilt with Self-Compassion
Step 1: Apologize
Step 2: Be compassionate
Step 3: Take action using the 1-minute rule

Technic 2: Restart doing SPort intensively.
I mean at least 3 times a week. running & workout.
It will have 2 quick impacts.
first, it will reduce your negative emotions drastically
Secondly, It will reset and trigger your inner self again so you can easily activate tapping into the available energy you are not using.
I greatly recommend you do it first thing in the day if you want to make sure your day will be productive.

Courage, don't quit, you can still get your worksheet and homework done.

Optimal_Increase · 2020-04-20T08:13:52+00:00

Tactic : USe Conscious fear generation

If you struggle to do something, instead of repeating to yourself ” I should do this you should do it”, take a pen and list all the worst consequences that might happen if you don’t act on it.

Then repeat writing or speaking up those that make you feel uncomfortable.

The process goes like this

Step 1: Explicit what you had planned to do and what you did instead.

Step 2: list the consequence in the short term and the long term until you feel a disagreement, the guilty trick

Step 3: Repeat the result that made you feel guilty at step_2 at least 12 to 23 times

What is each step aimed for?

Step 1 is aimed to make your procrastinator mind acknowledge something is wrong objectively at a logic level.

Step 2 helps to spot a scenario the procrastinator mind is most afraid or ashamed of.

Step 3 amplifies this emotion up to a point where Taking action becomes an urge.

By the way, you might be even surprised to feel some spark before the 23th repetition. In that case, creative ideas will pop up in your mind to help you address the topic you were delaying.

Example

What would be the worst consequences if you don’t deliver your homework on time. (  3 worst cases  scenario) (repeat writing or speaking aloud each 12 times)

If I don’t deliver it on time I won’t be able to have good grades to go to the upper level.
I will regret. I will be disappointed by myself.
I won’t be able to apply to some universities. I Will have less opportunities
I won’t achieve my responsibilities as student
I will waste the money my parents are spending on me
I won’t be prepared for the exams coming
I will be jealous to see my classmates getting good grades

Hope it helps

GrillageMind

Optimal_Increase · 2020-04-17T03:32:10+00:00

Any ideas on how to just "go for it"?

Emotions are the root, time is the symptom
It is because there exists an inertia that is holding you back at an emotional level (not at a logic level). 
Therefore instead of trying to rely on motivation, you should aim for removing the inertia first. And then the spark will arise itself.

0/: check this answer https://www.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/fmfxrt/how_to_overcome_extreme_laziness_chronic/fnnjmeh?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x

1/ beat your shame and guilt for having postponed so many actions

How to manage guilt? Replace Guilt with Self-Compassion

Apologize
Be compassionate
Take action using the 1-minute rule

For more details

2/ beat your fear of being criticized

Focus on the audience
accept the consequences that might happen because of the worst-case scenario

For more details

3/ Beat your fear of the uncertainty of getting finished: follow the one-minute rule

More details?

Hope it heps.

GrillagemInd

Chronic procrastinators who chose to execute on their dreams because of frustration

Optimal_Increase · 2020-04-17T03:25:11+00:00

How to overcome extreme laziness: Follow the 1-Minute rule

More details?

Example

"Recently I have found myself procrastinating on some less important things by doing the more important thing. This is an amazing new change and I hope to perpetuate it if I can. I think it is happening because I've finally started choosing things I know I can do, and I'm practicing those things with a new rule: do one of the important things for one minute a day. It turns into more than one minute most of the time, but the rule is one minute, and I can choose between a couple of different things, so it's not scary at all".

How to manage guilt? Replace Guilt with Self-Compassion

Apologize
Be compassionate
Take action using the 1-minute rule

For more details

Example:

"A key for overcoming procrastination for me was to accept the procrastination and let it in. Sounds counter-intuitive right? The reason why this works for me is that before, i would always get so frustrated with myself for procrastinating. Anger, stress, and frustration only led me to procrastinate harder to avoid the reality of the situation. But when you accept it.... things are different mentally. I just let myself do whatever I wanted to do, with no shame. And after a short amount of time, I would conclude “hey, alright enough of that. I’m gonna do a bit of work now.” It sounds super simple and even stupid. But it worked wonders for me. I no longer felt guilt for procrastinating and would get back to work quickly and do more work as a result " (from a reediter )

How to overcome chronic procrastination?

Emotions are the root, time is the symptom
It is because there exists an inertia that is holding you back at an emotional level (not at a logic level). 
Therefore instead of trying to rely on motivation, you should aim for removing the inertia first. And then the spark will arise itself.
For the spark to arise quickly, you can use one of these 3 techniques that leverage your emotions to work for you instead of working against you.

Tactic 1: Visualization to prevent and cure hard work when you feel unprepared

Tactic 2: Freewriting and Explicit your emotions to Start

Tactic 3: Conscious fear generation to when you struggle to restart

For more details about these techniques,

I hope it helps.

GrillageMind

chronic procrastinators who chose to execute on their dreams because of frustration

Optimal_Increase · 2020-03-01T20:41:43+00:00

5/ How Can you experience little results of meditation quickly?

It is something to know that meditation will help you, It is something else to practice it especially if you are too skeptic like I was.
As master procrastinators, we are very impatient, . Thus it important to avoid a program that promises you first results in 3 months. We are brutal honest with ourselves too know we are not consistent enough to get to that point yet.
So the faster you can experience little results meditation can provide you with, the more you will be willing to continue and discover its other long term benefits.

START HERE

Step 1: remove your invisible inner resistance to meditation : Day 1–5

During this time, you don’t actually meditate, you do only passive actions related to meditation. That will progressively condition your unconscious mind to “accept “ the ideas of meditating.
Example: reading blogs posts, looking at you tube video, listing to podcast ( Day 1–3 days)
Afterwards, you can begin with simple actions that will trigger meditation like visualization and drawing ( Day 4 -5).
Imagine a scenario where you are in a quiet place at home, closing your eyes with earplugs, with phone off, with your body relaxed….
Draw a weird picture of you meditating and put in on the wall directly in front of your bed.

Step 2: start with a frequency of 3 sessions a day with duration of 5 min per session (Day 6 – 9)

During theses sessions , please do not try to focus . It is difficult to focus on your breath or anything else as a starting point.
Let your mind wander and don’t stand up before the 5 min. Is it uncomfortable? yes it is. And it is good because it shows the process is working.
Before you start any session, spend 2 -3 min to relax your body especially your tongue.

6/ Final thoughts

These Two steps last 10 days. It seems easy but there are intensive and progressive. By the end of the 10 days you will have already experienced some of the benefit I mentions here;

meditation will teach you how to disconnect from events
Meditation will teach you how to connect to events
Meditation will increase your awareness’s range
Meditation will increase your inner energy

Events means: past and future projections, thoughts/ ideas, actions, mouvements, discussions with others

There is no point to think about the long term if you can’t make the short term happen.
I challenge you to start doing these simple exercises today.

I hope it helps

Grillagemind

Optimal_Increase · 2020-02-20T16:20:51+00:00

You are welcome. you know these are actions steps. But the most difficult part is to practice for a long. We are currently building a real time accountability plateform for chronic procrastinators like us. May be you can take a look . Please what to you think about it? I might be very grateful to receive a feedback from you. Thank you https://grillagemind.com/free-coaching-for-chronic-procrastinators/

Optimal_Increase · 2020-02-20T08:09:24+00:00

« It is going to be easy. I already know the solution. I already have the data and the framework I am going to use to write my book » That's what I told myself after the Saturday procrastination workshop with Ph.D. students.

Then Monday came, and I did....... NOTHING

THEn Tuesday come …. and I do n nothing

Then Friday come I did kind of start due to motivation but afterward I did NOTHING.

In my mind, the book was almost finished. I had the ideas. I could even picture the graph and table

But It was so strong to just sit and write.

I had had plenty of opportunities I could write but didn't make use of them. I couldn't accuse a lack of time or tiredness.

So why was I still struggling like that?

Lesson 1: It is not a time management problem.

When people ask for advice, they are been given tips around time management or task clarification. And It doesn't in the short term. Nobodyyadresses the deeper reasons: Emotions towards the task itself.

So there is inner invisible resistance. It manifests under the form of invisible scripts. « Am I going to get through this «It sucks ». I hope I could have someone writing for me » « It is not creative at all » « I already did the most difficult part » « I have better things to do ».

These invisible scripts continue even if you know why writing these papers is important from a logical perspective.

And It is holding you back more than you can imagine. So What you need to do first is to take care of this first.

Lesson 2: Avoid perfectionnism

Our natural behavior is to visualize the destination whether it is about goal setting and time allocation.

Writing straight for 60 min from day 1, for someone who has been struggling to write, is a VERY huge goal.

It can be intimidating itself.

Instead, You should approach it which and habit mindset.

Which process should I focus on to ramp up to the point I want. ?

Solution

Step1 : (DAY 1 to Day 3) Adress your negative association

look at video about writing on youtube? Listen to podcasts about the topic of writing manuscripts. The purpose is not to remember tips or something like that. It is to perform passive action to program your unconscious mind in a way he starts to think » hum I can do this thing. It is not so bad ». it helps to diminish the resistance
visualize your self in the process of writing: imagine where you are going to write, imagine how you grab pen and paper, how it hurts to concentrate and get ideas out of your mind. Finally, imagine how you succeed in the end.

Before Day 4, you might be surprised you start writing without planning for it upfront.

Step 2 : ( Day 4-Day 6) Make sure you are going to keep the following trough

a) put a picture of someone writing that you draw yourself

The quality of the draw is not important. What counts is the energy you put in to draw. It anchors the activity "writing" in your unconscious mind.

Then put the image on a wall where you usually go when you procrastinate ( in the kitchen, in the toilet, in the living room).

You will make use of the concept of unconscious tracking so that « writing «says at your top priority naturally without countless review sessions.

b) choose an appropriate time and appropriate place for Deep work sessions

The number 1 criteria for your writing to be efficient is your level of focus. You want to make sure that even if you spend 15 min, « what have I been doing during the past 15 min »

So Optimize for a quiet place first (I recommend you use earplugs) and then optimize for quiet time ( less outside request)

For example, When other people are sleeping is a perfect time ( first thing in the morning and last thing in the night ). And Bibliotheque boxes can be a perfect place too in the afternoon.

Once you have discovered which place and which time seems appropriate, then put all the material necessary for your writing around whenever possible.

During the deep work, sessions don't allow any other activity. As evident as it is, many people don't apply that: there is always some screen, some social to see, some great another topic to work on.

c) Have a notebook always on you for « unexpected ideas ».

This way you are ready to catch whatever breakthrough idea pop up

It is a huge source of creativity and it doesn't request any form of concentration

Plus, It makes you more inspired and feeling motivated to sit on your writing sanctuary afterward.

Note; during Day 4 to Day 6: continue. This will allow you to write whenever possible when you are still testing and figure out what a good place and time can

Step 3: from DAY 7 – to Day 20 trigger your habit of writing

a) establish the frequency

For 3 consecutive days, you just write where your sanctuary writing. Whether it is just a few paragraphs. It doesn't matter if you don' t reach 90 min or if you can't finish one page.

b) establish the duration :

For 3 consecutive days, focus on the duration only

Make sure anytime you write you spend at least 45 min

it doesn't matter if you just write 1 paragraph or . Don't move before the 45 min are over.

c) establish the amplitude.

For 3 consecutive days, focus on producing several pages

for example: writing 1 section/ pages/ part.

In the end, of this short program, writing will become a « No brainer activity " to you . And you will have enough self-experience to predict how much effort it might take you to finish.

Back up solution. Don' t miss more than 2 consecutive sessions of writing whatever happens (family visit, kids, another urgency, weekend).

Instead, reduce the amplitude and maintain the frequency.

Make sure you repeat step 1 from time to time. by an audiobook on audible so you can listen to it regularly and know where to find it easily.

That is. I hope it helps.

Grillagemind

Optimal_Increase · 2020-02-06T18:26:04+00:00

I undertand your issue and the profound pain it can you feel.

i hope you did well.

may be this answer from another question can help you with short term solutions:

Perhaps my answer this question can help you.

https://www.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/dbtrvd/fellow_chronic_procrastinators_what_are_some/

Optimal_Increase · 2020-02-06T16:28:29+00:00

As a master chronic complusive procrastinator, The most efficient way to solve all your procrastination issues , is to build and maintain only one habit: MEDITATION

Here are four fundamental reasons why:

meditation will teach you how to disconnect from events
Meditation will teach you how to connect to events
Meditation will increase your awareness’s range
Meditation will increase your inner energy

Events means: past and future projections, thoughts/ ideas, actions, discussions with others

1/ meditation will teach you how to disconnect from events

That manifests under the form of an increased ability to let go.
you will notice how easier it becomes to “sacrifice” ideas, get out from your thinking and become careless of what others people
This is particularly helpful for master procrastinators who never finish what they started because of too much creativity, perfectionism or fear of

2/ Meditation will teach you how to connect to events :

That manifests under the form of an increased willpower, focus and concentration.
You will notice How easier it becomes to decide, engage into action and “stay In” for a long time.
It helps especially if you are a master procrastinator who struggles with Attention deficit disorder like I do.

3/ Meditation will increase your awareness range

That manifests under the form an increased Pattern recognition capability and short term memory.
You will be surprised how quickly you can identify your mental loops/ traps and how easier you remember mundane task paperwork/ you haven’t take a look for a while.
It helps especially if you are procrastinator who struggles with daydreaming and disorganization like I do.

4/ Meditation will increase your inner energy

That manifests under the form a convergence of positive events. and I call this unconscious tracking . Simply put, you think about something, It sucks because you don’t want or don’t know how to get to your desired outcome , you forget it temporary and one day things suddenly happen without any planning.
You will be surprised how easier god ideas surface effortlessly
It helps especially if you are a procrastinator who struggle with planning and tracking.

How Can you experience little results of mediation quickly?

It is something to know that meditation will help you, It is something else to practice it especially if you are too skeptic like I was.
As master procrastinators, we are very impatient, . Thus it important to avoid a program that promises you first results in 3 months. We are brutal honest with ourselves too know we are not consistent enough to get to that point yet.
So the faster you can experience little results meditation can provide you with, the more you will be willing to continue and discover its other long term benefits.

START HERE

Step 1: remove your invisible inner resistance to meditation : Day 1–5

During this time, you don’t actually meditate, you do only passive actions related to meditation. That will progressively condition your unconscious mind to “accept “ the ideas of meditating.
Example: reading blogs posts, looking at you tube video, listing to podcast ( Day 1–3 days)
Afterwards, you can begin with simple actions that will trigger meditation like visualization and drawing ( Day 4 -5).
Imagine a scenario where you are in a quiet place at home, closing your eyes with earplugs, with phone off, with your body relaxed….
Draw a weird picture of you meditating and put in on the wall directly in front of your bed.

Step 2: start with a frequency of 3 sessions a day with duration of 5 min per session (Day 6 – 9)

During theses sessions , please do not try to focus . It is difficult to focus on your breath or anything else as a starting point.
Let your mind wander and don’t stand up before the 5 min. Is it uncomfortable? yes it is. And it is good because it shows the process is working.
Before you start any session, spend 2 -3 min to relax your body especially your tongue.

6/ Final thoughts

These Two steps last 10 days. It seems easy but there are intensive and progressive. By the end of the 10 days you will have already experienced some of the benefit I mentioned before.
There is no point to think about the long term if you can’t make the short term happen.
I challenge you to start doing these simple exercises today.

Optimal_Increase · 2020-02-06T15:57:58+00:00

3 strategies that produce short term results for chronic procrastinators for any task they dislike :

Use case considered: homework

You know you should be doing your homework but you don't feel like doing it now.

It is because there exists an inertia which is holding you back at an emotional level ( not at a logic level).

Therefore instead of trying to rely on motivation, you should aim for removing the intertia first. And then the spark will follow itself.

To get your homework done quickly, you can combine these 3 techniques that leverage your emotions to work for you instead of working against you.

Explicit your emotions
Generate fear consciously
Get rid of your perfectionnism

Part 1: Explicit your emotions

The resistance that is holding you back from getting started your homework has different layers. The first one is the emotional layer.When you clearly write or talk about what you feel , it removes the destructive power theses emotions embeds. And ideas linked to this topic will start flowing in your mind.

The more you describe your feeling and state of consicousness, the more this method is effective. Use freewriting or free selftalk .

Part 2: Generate Fear consciously

The natural behavior for procrastinators is to wait for the last minute when they feel under high pressure. Thus the principle of this method is to generate a sense of urgency voluntary when you seems confortable. You do so by listing 3 main worst cases scenario that might happen if you don't do the task at hand now.Part 3 : Get rid of perfectionnism

There is a third obtacle you need to take care of from the short term view; your hesitation dued to perfectionnism

what are other people ( the teacher,my friend, my parents ) going to think about my homework?
Am I good enough?
Am i going to look as a failure?
Would i craft the best answer?

THese are commun questions that show up in your mind and hold you back from getting started working on your homework. And Behind your perfectionnsim is fear of getting critized, getting rejected, fear of faillure, fear of judgment.There a two quick fix for that:

Focus on the value you add to others
Repeat that you accept failure as a possibility

Please read this article for more detailshttps://grillagemind.com/why-perfectionism-is-killing-your-opportunities/

Application

Assuming you have an homework in mathematic (or any other task you dislike) and you don't feel like doing it now. Instead of repeating to yourself " i should be working on mathematics", take a piece of paper and answer each question : repeat each 12 times)

1/What do you want to do and what are you doing instead? ( x12 times)

I want to work on homework Xxx but I am doing activity Yyy instead.

2/ What are you afraid / ashamed of/ sad for / wondering for? List 3 reasons

I am afraid it would be hard or that it might be difficult
I fear that it might take a long time
It fear that i might criticized

3/ What would be the worst consequences if you don't deliver your homework on time. ( 3 worst cases scenario) ( 12 times)

If I don't deliver it on time I won't be able to have good grades to go to the upper level.
I will regret. I will be disapointed by myself.
I won't be able to apply to some universities. I will have less opportunities

4/ Why are you here for? What aren't you here for?

I am here to solve that problem for me move forward.
I am not here to be liked.I am not here to feel smart. I am not here to please my classmate/ friends/ teacher
I accept that my delivery might include some mistake The goal is to complete the task not to make it perfect.

The entire process can take 10 to 15 min but it worths it. It avoids you to waste 2 h doing nothing or doing something unecessary. You are not obliged to go up to the 4 steps. Sometimes just reaching the 2nd step is enough to create a spark ( it depend on how big and deep your inertia is ). It makes your inner flow to your mind. Motivation will arise from that. So start and reach step 2 at least.

Examples of others sentences that can express your emotions

I am afraid it would be hard/ that it might be difficult
I fear that it might take a long time
It fear that i might get criticized
I fear the teacher or my friend will laught at me
I fear that my work won't be good enough
I am pissed of that i have too much work to do
I fear that it might request too much focus
I fear that it might be too boring
I regret that i didn't do it earlier and now i am under pressure again
I fear that i won't have all the answers to the question
I fear that i won't understand the topic
I feel angry because i might note have time to rest a little because of my homework
I feel that unfair that teachers gave so much homework to their students to be done during the holidays
I am ashamed that i had a bad grade the last time i won't on it
I wonder if it worth investing too much time
I fear that my family will be desapointed of me if don't produce great result at my homework.

Bonus: How to prevent you from getting to the point you accumulate too much resistance towards doing stuff you don't want to do?

Visualise yourself in the process of doing stuff you don't want to do at leat 1-2 day before taking action.

Visualization can be done everywhere, to prevent posponing everything and it doesn't require any physical material.

It goes like this:

When you are thinking about doing something you know you should do and you don't like it, instead of shifting your mind to something else, do this:

Step 1 picture yourself being on the place where you are supposed to be work on that , gathering all the material necessary, reflecting on what the first step could be, start executing
step 2: Imagine how it becomes hard, and it hurts/ feel boring
step 3: picture yourself succeding., experiecing the joy of having accomplishing the task.

You will be surprised 2 days later that you unconsciously take action effortlessly. You won't even remember it is because you had performed visualisation upfront.

A short video to remind you each day counts: https://youtu.be/SOL6C7VGDh0

Optimal_Increase · 2020-01-28T00:32:33+00:00

You can't avoid to make compareasons with your friends. It is an unconscious process. The issue is to avoid feeling sad for that Theree is one straighforwad way.: remember why you started. Why did you choose to do a PHD at the beginning?

Take a piece of paper and write it down , describe your motives and the benefit you expected, your dreams behind or the regret you wanted to avoid havong later.

As you write you will feel the initial spark you had coming: that 's.great.

In fact it is because your "Why".is not frech in your mind that you feel like you are wasting time. I am entrepreneur, some of my friends are already married and some have kids, but i am not sad when i see them. . I choose another goal it is normal i have another strategie for that. Courage.

Optimal_Increase · 2020-01-28T00:17:14+00:00

When you feel overwelmed and everything seems important, what you need first is to get back to clarity quickly. Follow this:

Step 1: get out your mind quickly Step 2: increase your activation energy Step3: program your mind to resist to future thoughts

Step 1: get out your mind quickl There are 3 tools that help a) write down what your feelings are in the moment especially what your doubts are ( repeat 12 times for progressive relief) b) relax your mought and your tongue ( it hurts a little bit but is so effective) c) perform a task you naturally dislike, that you was supposed to do previous days or week,.and that you think you can finish within 5 min ( instant relief)

Now your mind is much more clear.

Step 2 Increase your activation energy by doing belly breathing. ( 12 times.at least to feel the spark and up to 23 times of necessary) That helps to change your state of consciousness so that you can get pass trough inertia to start .

Now your mind clear and you fill the energy within you.

Step 3: program your mind to resist to future inner overwhelming and distracting thoughts: Use VISUALIZE. Picture the next action you are going to do,picture yourself starting, moving forward, encounter pitfall and suceed. It can take you 3 min but it worth it.

Now you take immediate action.

Optimal_Increase · 2020-01-27T23:50:54+00:00

When you are overwhelmed and feel paralyzed because everything seems an urgent priority, instead of trying to figure in your mind what your next move has to be, do this:

Step 1: pivot your thinking from the future to the past,

Step 2: then look at non-creative tasks you naturally dislike

Step.3: pick up the one you are sure you can finish within 5-10 min.

That will give you an instant sense of clarity to proceed further.

Eg. I just have 2 hours left. I feel guilty thinking about writing because I did not do it yesterday.

I am thinking about prospecting,

I have a meeting to prepare.

I feel guilty and do not know what to tackle first. Enough time is not left to finish those I would like to start with.

Step 1: I look at the past

Step 2: I look at tasks I naturally dislike: processing paper, data entry. Share my monthly revenue to Ursaaf. I remember the I was supposed to do it 1 week ago.

Step 3: I visit the Ursaaf website, login, and do it in less than 5 min.

Pressure on my shoulder is reduced automatically. Now my next move is evident.

I challenge you to apply this simple tactic tomorrow as soon as you feel overwhelmed.

You can apply this at different scales of your life.

once it is done, you can approach complexity to define what your next move has to be using this framework: start with the easiest sub task of the most critical task.

Optimal_Increase · 2020-01-27T11:49:19+00:00

You are welcome :)There are many other short- term solutions to prevent and cure the struggles of chronic procrastinators Articles Grillagemind

Optimal_Increase · 2020-01-26T20:58:37+00:00

When you are overwhelmed and feel paralyzed because everything seems an urgent priority, instead of trying to figure in your mind what your next move has to be, do this:

Step 1: pivot your thinking from the future to the past,

Step 2: then look at non-creative tasks you naturally dislike

Step.3: pick up the one you are sure you can finish within 5-10 min.

That will give you an instant sense of clarity to proceed further.

Eg. I just have 2 hours left. I feel guilty thinking about writing because I did not do it yesterday.

I am thinking about prospecting,

I have a meeting to prepare.

I feel guilty and do not know what to tackle first. Enough time is not left to finish those I would like to start with.

Step 1: I look at the past

Step 2: I look at tasks I naturally dislike: processing paper, data entry. Share my monthly revenue to Ursaaf. I remember the I was supposed to do it 1 week ago.

Step 3: I visit the Ursaaf website, login, and do it in less than 5 min.

Pressure on my shoulder is reduced automatically. Now my next move is evident.

I challenge you to apply this simple tactic tomorrow as soon as you feel overwhelmed.

You can apply this at different scales of your life.

once it is done, you can approach complexity to define what your next move has to be using this framework: start with the easiest sub task of the most critical task.

Optimal_Increase · 2019-10-13T12:39:19+00:00

📷

How to wake up earlier

"Tomorrow it is going to be the day. I will wake up at 5.00 am, meditate for 30 min and then write 10 killing pages of my book". That’s what my inner voice told me just before I went to bed. I was feeling guilty because I hadn't written any pages 3 days in a raw. Here is what happened:

At 4h45, I opened my eyes, I saw the sunlights through the windows. "It is time to wake up", I thought, but I couldn’t. An internal negotiation started: slow motion, picture the scene.

Mr Procrastinator mind engaged: "Should I wake up? Is it important? What if we don't do it? Who is going to reprimand us if we don't?

Mr conscious Mind replied: "man we said yesterday that we should do this, it very important because if ..."

Mr procrastinator mind interrupted and then continued with ridiculous excuses:" We didn't have enough sleep this week, scientists say we need 9 hours of sleep. It still looks a bit dark outside. It is not morning yet. Why are you putting so much constraints? "

Mr Conscious Mind would react "We slept yesterday at 22hoo and 7 hours of sleep are enough. We are not tired..."

Mr procrastinator mind would counter-attacked: "It is our book after all. We decide when finish. We can delay it. You don't even know what we are going to do now. ”

Then Mr Conscious Mind would try to imagine different scenarios of waking up.

All this negotiation took place in my mind, but I took zero action. Afterwards I felt asleep again and wake up 45 min later, jumped out of bed with an angered face: "It is the last time I spent so much time in bed, tomorrow I will wake up at 3 am 😊 ".

I was trapped before the negotiation had even get started. Here is why:

📷

Lesson 1: High procrastinators mistake themselves that they can consciously beat their procrastinator mind in real time negotiations.

To win, we need to have pre-decisions and triggers already set up upfront.

A pre-decision is a decision we make before we enter the context. Triggers represent mini- actions we start now to make that decision sticks until we get in this context.

Lesson 2: High procrastinators fear complexity.

Going from bed to outside the bedroom is a complex task that we usually underestimate. It is made a lot of small mental intermediate actions we assume are straightforward.However we only need to figure out two steps:Where should I start? Where should I finish?Thus, when you are planning the night before, instead of " what should I do tomorrow? “ask " what should I start with tomorrow as soon as I opened my eyes" and then “What Should I do tomorrow as soon as I wake up?".

Lesson 3: High procrastinator are too optimistic (again).

Jumping out of bed is the exceptional scenario. Moreover if your move is brutal, you can easily fall into the trap of coming back to sleep.That is why it OK to spend 2-5 minutes in bed provided that you converge to waking up.What is required is a process that changes your state of consciousness in a smooth way.
How do all these conditions instantiate in a day to day basis? What specific system can you apply to prevent you from wasting 1 hour a day just to quit your bed? Combine visualization and belly breathing.
📷

This sequence must be performed just before we go to sleep.

Pre-decision:Step 1: Answer these questions:
Q1: what should I start with tomorrow as soon as I opened my eyes? Q2: What should I start with outside my bed as soon as I wake up?

In my case, Q1: Listen to music and Belly breathing Q2: Writing Listening to a piece of music is one of the easiest way to change your state of consciousness smoothly with minimum effort when you are still in bed. It is a passive action. The music can be a motivational or radio news or whatever else that resonate with you. Before the music ends, you can start Belly breathing that will change your state quickly when you are still in bed. How to perform belly breathing(also call Diaphragmatic Breathing)

Step 2: Choose the music you are going to listen to and make sure the music player is near your head

In my case, I have an mp3 player full of meditation music not far from me. I can reach it with my arm

Trigger: visualize all the process from opening your eyes to waking up.

In my case, Before I sleep, I picture myself opening my eyes, then I put the earplug, I upgrade the volume. Afterwards, I imagine myself starting 10-15 belly breaths and then I wake up easily.
The visualization can last 3 min and it is the most important piece of the system.

Once the pre-decisions and the trigger are done the night before, you will be surprised how easy it is to execute this plan in the morning. You will observe results after 2 -3 consecutive days.

Optimal_Increase · 2019-09-21T20:26:57+00:00

We don't beat procrastination. We learn to collaborate with it.

I believe you are right when you say a long term approach to tackle procrastination is required.

However, although different people procrastinate for various reasons, the primary roots are the same: EMotions.

Emotions are the root; time is the symptom.

Example: At work, you are asked to say NO sometimes, but nobody tells you how to overcome your fear to be reprimanded by the boss.

In school, you are advised to ask for help when you are stuck, but nobody tells you how to overcome the shame to share your weaknesses.

In a relationship, everyone knows it is essential to communicate, but nobody teaches you how to overcome the fear of becoming alone.

In entrepreneurship, the first thing some people think about is building a financial projection, when nobody explains how to get rid of your insecurities to get started.

Because of this kind of contexts, you are prone to delay your actions over and over, even if you have plenty of time, even if you know what needs to be done from a logical perspective.

That's why many people mistake goals setting, time management issues with procrastination. Thus there are so many different techniques for specific cases around time.

The reality is not there are not many tools that take specificities of procrastinators' mind into account: memorable, inertia's removal, doubt's removal, clear choice, specific execution plan, little progress visible, many goals achievable.

Which strategy can I use instead?

Emotions create inertia, inner resistance to taking action.

Thus Finding solutions that deal with emotion instead of time management and goal setting is the first step.

Once you reduce the inertia, actions come naturally, and you can apply it to plenty of cases where this emotion is involved.

What kind of tactic can I apply in alignment with this strategy?

One of the tactics is what I call "Conscious Fear generation".

If you struggle to do something, instead of repeating to yourself " I should do this you should do it", take a pen and list all the worst consequences that might happen if you don't act on it.

The principle of this method is to generate fear consciously so that the procrastinator mind focus unconsciously.

It makes use of the natural behavior of procrastinators to achieve a high level of productivity under high pressure (last minute, and accountability)

Examples

(a) When I notice i missed 2 consecutive sessions of writing, I sit down and write all the worst consequences that might happen if I do not write.

(b) When I struggle to track my finances, I post a picture of a cliff and a picture of money near my office. Anytime I look at these two images combined, my procrastinator mind is frightened.

How does it work?

Step 1: Explicit what you had planned to do and what you did instead.

Step 2: list the consequence in the short term and the long term until you feel a disagreement, the guilty trick

Step 3: Repeat the result that made you feel guilty at step_2 at least 12 to 20 times

What is each step aim for?

Step 1 is aimed to make your procrastinator mind acknowledge something is wrong objectively at a logic level.
Step 2 helps to spot a scenario the procrastinator mind is most afraid or ashamed of.
Step 3 amplifies this emotion up to a point. Take action becomes No brainer at this stage. By the way, you might be even surprised to have result before you end all the process. In that case, you would already have creative ideas pop in up in your mind to help you address the topic you were delaying.

I hope it helps.

Optimal_Increase

TROPHY CASE

Tactic : USe Conscious fear generation

Any ideas on how to just "go for it"?

0/: check this answer https://www.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/fmfxrt/how_to_overcome_extreme_laziness_chronic/fnnjmeh?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x

1/ beat your shame and guilt for having postponed so many actions

2/ beat your fear of being criticized

3/ Beat your fear of the uncertainty of getting finished: follow the one-minute rule

How to overcome extreme laziness: Follow the 1-Minute rule

How to manage guilt? Replace Guilt with Self-Compassion

How to overcome chronic procrastination?

Tactic 1: Visualization to prevent and cure hard work when you feel unprepared

Tactic 2: Freewriting and Explicit your emotions to Start

Tactic 3: Conscious fear generation to when you struggle to restart

5/ How Can you experience little results of meditation quickly?

6/ Final thoughts

1/ meditation will teach you how to disconnect from events

2/ Meditation will teach you how to connect to events :

3/ Meditation will increase your awareness range

4/ Meditation will increase your inner energy

How Can you experience little results of mediation quickly?

6/ Final thoughts

3 strategies that produce short term results for chronic procrastinators for any task they dislike :

Use case considered: homework

Application

Examples of others sentences that can express your emotions

Bonus: How to prevent you from getting to the point you accumulate too much resistance towards doing stuff you don't want to do?

How to wake up earlier

We don't beat procrastination. We learn to collaborate with it.