A wide-awake look at procrastination
This winter-spring tussle that’s going on reminds me a whole lot of the back-and-forth “time wrestling” that our learners, and us as parents and professionals, all struggle with.
There’s so much to do, and also there’s the importance of rest. There are heartfelt ambitions, and also there are profound obligations and commitments. There are plans, and then there is so much, maybe even almost everything, that’s beyond our control. Which is to say: there’s a lot on our and our learners’ plates; meanwhile, there often feels like not a lot of time.
And then, we go and procrastinate. Why do our learners put things off or push things away?
They’re confused (and don’t really know what the ask is).
They’re scared (to do badly, or to fail).
They’re not set up well (messy space, disruptive environment, unpredictable context).
They’re anxious (and immobilized).
They’re injured, sick, or exhausted (and bodies can’t be overridden, at least not for long).
They’re depleted (and long to experience micro-moments of pleasure and fun).
Given that procrastination makes things worse in the long-run, why do learners (and all of us) procrastinate? Because we’re bored with the task and want to do something more interesting and fun; because we get distracted by and pulled into more immediately compelling activities; because the discomfort we feel in the face of the work we know we need to do is hard to sit with.
There are many (more) possibilities as to why procrastination pervades already being tight-on-time.
The iterations are, in a sense, endless. Procrastination can be part of a diagnosis, or not. It can be a long-time habit, or not. It can be just in one subject or area of life, yet not in others. It can get better, or worse, over time. What’s most interesting to me is what we can do about it. What we as parents can nudge our learners to try; what we can experiment with.
Why?
It’s not really about getting the work done. Rather, it’s that with a clear path through the work comes times for rest, play, and connection before, in between, and after. It makes rest more restful and pleasure more pleasurable.
When we procrastinate with something that’s supposed to be fun yet still know that we have that un-fun work to do? Well, it makes the fun thing less fun. And I want all beings to have fun! So, here are a few things you can try to prevent procrastination and have more fun when you’re having that fun!
#1: Why time management hacks don’t quite cut it
There are SO many tips and tools and interventions about “time management.” And yet.
And yet, questions about productivity, prioritization, and procrastination are some of the questions I get asked about the most. By students of all ages. By parents in all contexts.
It is tremendously hard to get stuff done. There’s a lot to do. There’s a feeling that there’s never enough time to do it all in. And yet.
And yet, we intensify the stress and struggle by putting things off and pushing things away. Then there’s even more to do (after all, that to-do list gets added to daily, maybe even hourly) and less time to do it in.
So if all those strategies are so potent, why do they fail? Why aren’t we all better at getting stuff done? Why don’t we have friends and colleagues and family say, “I got it! I won at time management! I don’t procrastinate anymore!” I’ve literally NEVER heard that. From ANYONE.
This piercing piece from HBR about what really matters in “managing” time, why time slips away from us, and why procrastination is so hard to shift. (It feels like it was written for the Awakened Learning community as it puts that waking-up, learning-in awareness piece front and centre!)
For me, the best line in the piece is this: “...the skills comprising time management precede the effectiveness of any tool or app…” BOOM!
#2: It’s more about tasks than time
This week alone, I’ve had four student clients (one in high school, one in their first year, one in their middle post-secondary years, one in their final year), each in wildly different subject areas and programs, all reflect on our 1:1 work together agenda-ing, prioritizing school/life balance, and moving away from managing time to managing tasks AND resourcedness.
Many students leave it at, “I’m going to stop procrastinating by writing down all my deadlines.” Or, “If I make a window of time to do something, it’ll get done somehow.”
Two conundrums: one, a deadline end-date doesn’t reveal the process and time required to meet that deadline; two, even if you wrote in an hour block here and there to “study” or “write essay,” there are no clear directives as to what to do in that hour of studying or writing.
So, here’s what I’ve asked my student-clients to do, and am getting GREAT feedback on. You can try it out yourself in your own work and by gently nudging your own learner to give it a go:
Get a physical agenda that actually works for you and your time-noting preferences (ie. hour-by-hour, a day per page, month-view, etc.). It doesn’t have to be fancy.
Write down all the deadlines and due dates.
Write down all appointments, classes / meetings, and commitments.
Write in non-negotiable caring-for-self activities (ie. movement times / classes, community gatherings, spiritual or activism engagements).
Write in the broken down / “chunked” process dates to get to those deadlines and due dates. Think small sub-tasks, think scheduling the “parts” of the whole. For studying, this could be “practice 15 math questions from chapter 2.” For essay- or lab-writing, this could be “write 200 words” or “complete point form outline” or “finish introduction.”
Write down a schedule-your-scheduling time mid or late-afternoon each Sunday.
Why does this all matter?
If we only focus on windows of time to, in principle, tend to a task, the task won’t necessarily get done. There are no metrics. There’s no clear boundary about what counts as finished for the day.
Writing in the actual task, not just the minutes you have available, means that within that window, you know what you need to get done. And, the beauty is that if you finish early, you’ve freed up more time!
And, this kind of sub-task by sub-task, leads learners to identify what they need to do (what “done” means), give themselves brief directions (what to “do” with that window of time), and enable a looking-back at what’s accomplished, which fuels motivation to do another dedicated, directed work window soon.
Wishing you and your learners SO well in your own procrastination-preventing, non-toxic productivity.
In kindness and healthy learning,
Deena