May I? Procrastinating On My Serial Procrastination
Tomorrow.
Later.
Just not at this very moment.
Do you ever wake up with an intense feeling that there’s something you should be doing? Or there’s a place in life that you should be, but something or someone seems to be holding you back from it? You end up feeling like a mediocre imposter inhabiting the body of a legend.
Do the thoughts of your potential wasting away often haunt you? There’s so much you can do, but you feel like you’re just not ready yet. What do you do when that pressing feeling comes? How do you cope with the thought that where you are now is a million steps behind where you could be at this point?
Do you pray? Do you talk yourself out of that depressive state?
Or do you get up and do something about the situation you find yourself?
For instance, let’s say you’re pretty good at taking jaw-dropping photographs of people. Everyone says you’re great. Everyone wants you to take their picture because you always get their angles right. But you don’t feel you’re good enough to start up a photography career. Or you have exceptional ideas for potential best-selling fantasy stories in your head, but they stay in your head. Maybe you’d work on them when you’re ready. One day.
We think we have time; after all, there’s always tomorrow. And the next. And next week. And next month. Until the year comes to an end. Then you wonder where all the time went, and you regret not getting it done sooner.
Maybe you’ve been pushing back on so many things because you want them to be a certain way. Perfection or nothing! So what do you choose? To hold on until it’s all perfect when, deep down, you know it’s seemingly impossible? Or to not begin because you want everything to fall in place immediately?
Perhaps, you’re worried that you’d try something out and fail at it. Then you don’t bother to start at all. Or, eager to be seen as efficient, you volunteer to take on various tasks. Eventually, you become overwhelmed by them, and you end up not doing most of it and feeling sorry for your inefficient self. Or you’ve become such a procrastinator that you now believe that you work better under pressure. So you leave tasks until the very deadline and then rush to complete them at the very last minute.
If any of these sound familiar, it’s time to take a step back and assess what’s been holding you back. Anxiety? The fear of failing? Laziness? Poor time management? Overwhelm? Thinking you work better under pressure? Worry? All that doesn’t matter now. You can forgive yourself for the opportunities lost from procrastination, and move on.
I often say to myself, “Start small. Do a little every day, then build up from there.” But I don’t because I want to start it right. And, in that case, I am holding myself back from working towards those goals. I’ve held back on writing, designing outfits, and all the other things I truly love to do because I want them to be perfect from the start. And so I never started, until now.
What have you been holding yourself from achieving? That banging body you know you can exercise into reality? Travel goals? A more financially stable career? Stronger networking skills? Your dream car? Sometimes it takes a traumatic experience to make us face our fears and start living the life we truly desire. Don’t wait until then.
I’ve always had big, almost-scary goals for myself. But I let fear, shame and self-doubt hold me back for a good part of my life. What if people think my work is mediocre? Am I good enough? I’m not that special, so maybe I don’t deserve to be successful.
I want to say all that has changed, and I am the happiest I have ever been. But that would be a lie. I realise now that I need to be more open and accepting of who I am, and stop making excuses for not doing the things I really want to. I need to share my knowledge and ideas with as many people as possible. Hopefully, that’ll encourage someone or prevent another from going through a similar situation. I know I am not alone.
Would it really be better to try and fail than to not have tried at all? If your “forever” ended tomorrow, would this be how you’d want to have spent it, waiting for tomorrow?
Over the years, I have learned that the little decisions we make can spiral into great things. It’s hardly ever just one big decision; there are a million little things that contribute to the greatness you see.
So take a little decision today and stick to it. Build upon it from there. Ask yourself the one thing you want a month or a decade from now, and then break it down into smaller goals you can achieve.
My name is Chidirim, and I’m a serial procrastinator. But I’ve decided to procrastinate on procrastination. I’ll do the work right now and procrastinate tomorrow. I intend to write away my anxieties until I’m the true Content Queen I desire to be. This post is my first step towards that goal. Whether I believe it or not, I am enough. I deserve to be happy. I deserve to be successful, and so do you.
Will you join me today?
Thank you, Lex, for encouraging me to do this. Thank you, also, to everyone who has pushed me to do better and stop feeling so low. I appreciate you.
May I? Procrastinating On My Serial Procrastination
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