Wisdom-Trek / Creating a Legacy

Welcome to Day 149 of our Wisdom-Trek, and thank you for joining me.

This is Guthrie Chamberlain, Your Guide to Wisdom.

2 Steps to Overcome Procrastination 

Thank you for joining us for our 7 day a week, 7 minutes of wisdom podcast. This is Day 149 of our Trek, and yesterday we explored the trail of how change begins with a choice and how making the proper choices in how we treat others will allow us to become a person of influence. Today we will explore that difficult trail of overcoming procrastination.

We are recording our podcast from our studio at Home2 in Charlotte, North Carolina, although we will be at The Big House when this episode is released. It is really a blessing to be able to work remotely from any location as long as we have an internet connection. As technology continues to improve, it will become even easier in the future.

Today as we head out on our trail, we are having a discussion about how easy it is to put off our responsibilities and how we allow non-important interruptions to distract us from doing what is most important. This is an age old issue, but there are so many distractions both online and offline, it is very difficult not to procrastinate especially if you are not very disciplined in your focus. Perseverance is so important to make sure we continue on life’s trail towards the summit.

Perseverance is about as important to achievement as gasoline is to driving a car. Sure, there will be times when you feel like you're spinning your wheels, but you'll always get out of the rut with genuine perseverance. Without it, you won't even be able to start your engine.

Perseverance vs. Procrastination

The opposite of perseverance is procrastination. Perseverance means you never quit. Procrastination usually means you never get started although the inability to finish something is also a form of procrastination.

Ask people why they procrastinate and you'll often hear something like this, “I'm a perfectionist. Everything has to be just right before I can get down to work. No distractions, not too much noise, no telephone calls interrupting me, and of course I have to be feeling well physically, too. I can't work when I have a headache. ” The other end of procrastination – being unable to finish – also has a perfectionist explanation…"I'm just never satisfied. I'm my own harshest critic. Unless all the I's are dotted and all the Tt's are crossed, I just can't consider that I'm done. That's just the way I am, and I'll probably never change."

Do you see what's going on here? A fault is being turned into a virtue. The perfectionist is saying that their standards are just too high for this world. This fault-into-virtue syndrome is a common defense when people are called upon to discuss their weaknesses, but in the end it's just a very pious kind of excuse making. It certainly doesn't have anything to do with what's really behind procrastination.

The basis of procrastination could be fear of failure. That's what perfectionism really is once you take a hard look at it. What's the difference whether you're afraid of being less than perfect or afraid of anything else?  You're still paralyzed by fear. What's the difference whether you never start or never finish? You're still stuck. You're still going nowhere. You're still overwhelmed by whatever task is before you. You’re still allowing yourself to be dominated by a negative vision of the future. In your mind you see yourself being criticized, laughed at, punished, or ridden out of town on a rail. Of course, this negative vision of the future is really a mechanism that allows you to do nothing. It's a very convenient mental tool.

I'm going to tell you how to overcome procrastination. I'm going to show you how to turn procrastination into pe...