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Keys to stop procrastinating according to Harvard

In 2016, this university published an interesting report on this terrible habit with some tips on how to get rid of it.

Science has found several reasons that can explain this phenomenon:

  1.  Fear of failure. Not doing the activity and creating excuses to divert blame can be a psychological protection mechanism if the person has a lot of anxiety and fear of failure. 
  2.  Fear of success. Since a person may have low self-esteem, he or she may end up feeling that he or she does not deserve to be successful. 
  3.  Lack of discipline, order, time management or planning. 
  4.  Problems with homework. Perhaps you find the task or activity boring or irrelevant.  
  5.  Optimism. The optimistic and idealistic person thinks that no matter how long it takes, he or she will still be able to do the task well.

We have all heard more than once or twice a term that at first sounded more than strange to us: procrastination.

Procrastinating is simply putting things off until tomorrow, no more, no less. But what does procrastination have to do with success or with failure? That has been the debate that has filled hundreds of thousands of pages and thoughts over the past twelve months.

One of the conclusions of the studies and research that universities, companies and organizations have carried out on procrastination is something quite obvious: we all procrastinate, but until not long ago, this word was restricted to the faculties of Psychology, to the subject of Senior management courses for executives or at training activities aimed at young professionals who wanted to learn leadership and business management techniques.

But what exactly does it consist of? procrastinateWhat is procrastination?

To find a good definition of the word we only have to look for the meaning of the two Latin words that gave rise to the term “procrastination” in English and procrastinación in Spanish: pro which means “to leave” and cras which we could translate as “tomorrow”.

But let's go a little further by saying that procrastination is a habit that is as difficult to break as any other custom we have implemented in our daily lives.

But to complicate the scenario a little more, psychologists explain to us that the real reason for procrastinate It is in our subconscious since we avoid doing something because it causes us pain, discomfort, uneasiness or any other negative sensation.

By putting off that disturbing sensation for another time, our subconscious calms down and our brain does not have to process that negative information.

So… there is no cure for procrastination? That is precisely what brilliant minds are working on, such as, for example, a group of investigation of the famous Harvard University in the United States.

This university published an interesting article in 2016 report on procrastination, its repercussions on the student and professional success and some tips to get rid of this harmful habit easily. Here are the two most important ones.

1. Weigh the pros and cons to assess the consequences

Procrastinating is positive in the short term as it prevents us from “suffering” a certain situation. But this habit also tends to have undesirable consequences: failing an exam, not delivering a project on time, not offering work incentives your employees to increase their productivity, not to solve the internal communication problems that we know exist in our company, etc.

2. Trust in your abilities and motivate yourself with small rewards

As any good coaching professional will tell you, self-confidence is essential to ending any habit that is negatively affecting our professional life and procrastination is no exception to the rule.

But how can we trust in our abilities if we can't stop procrastinating? We motivate ourselves not to do so by offering ourselves small, short-term rewards.

These rewards can be as simple as we want and we ourselves decide what can satisfy and reward us at the end of the work done: leaving work early, going to the cinema or to an exhibition that interests us, practicing some sport at the end of the day, having a drink with colleagues, watching a series at the end of the day, etc.

If you want to learn more about personal productivity, we recommend the guide: ….