Overcoming Procrastination

If I have to name one most notorious thing in the world, I'd put "Procrastination" on that wanted notice to hunt it down and drive it out of its lair. Unfortunately, with all its downsides noted, we are still quite powerless in the battle against it. During my research on procrastination, something intriguing popped up--Temporal Motivation Theory. TMT is an integrative motivational theory, developed by Piers Steel and Cornelius J. König, that emphasizes time as a critical, motivational factor. According to Schmidt, Dolis, and Tolli, TMT "may help further the understanding of the impact of time, and particularly deadlines, on dynamic attention allocation." The TMT formula can be applied to the human behavior, procrastination and to goal setting. The theory states an individual's motivation for a task can be derived with the following formula (in its simplest form):

Motivation = Expectancy × Value ÷(1 + Impulsiveness × Delay)

where Motivation, the desire for a particular outcome, Expectancy or self-efficacy is the probability of success, Value is the reward associated with the outcome, Impulsiveness is the individual’s sensitivity to delay and Delay is the time to realization.

Based on TMT, all factors have the potential to weaver our motivation and sabotage our performance for a certain task. The equation won’t provide us with a fixed quantification of our motivation, which is supposed to be fluctuating till the end of the mission. However, breaking the equation down will gives us enough clues to work on an effective method to narrow the range and have a better shot.

· Expectancy

Self-efficacy consists of three inseparable elements: environment, competence, evaluation, but ultimately it all comes down to our objective perception of our subjective self.

· Value

The economic value (short-term) and the spiritual value (long-term) based on our identity.

· Impulsiveness

Sensitivity to delay. The more sensitive we are to time length, the less likely we’ll be to follow the original plan.

· Delay

The longer the time period lasts, the less attractive the task appears. That explains why the appeal of instant gratifications always outweighs that of deferred gratifications.

And that'll lead us directly to the nest of procrastination.

· Lack of Confidence

Suffice it to say that we’ll be thrilled to get started if what we’re dealing with is something easy and fun coz generally it takes no efforts, however, that’s rarely the case with our work, study or long-term goals. What we set ourselves up for is much more challenging on both physical and psychological level, which means that we’re bound to be confronted with the harsh reality that we might fail in each attempt. Unfortunately, most of us tend to exaggerate that probability to such an overwhelming proportion that we start to get cold feet about any further plans. As a counteractive move to save ourselves from shame and guilt, we devise a self-deceptive device to evade failure—doing nothing at all so that no errors or setbacks will surface, i.e. procrastinating. That’s literally the major barrier that keeps us from the realization of our targets.

Solution: There’s no such a perfect antidote known as immediate-effective-injection-for-confidence-boost, bummer. But it’s always up to us to take a different move. Why don’t we start with all the information we have on the current situation? Note them all down so that they’re more visible to us. Run a detailed analysis on our SWOT (strengths, weaknesses, opportunities & threats) to get a better idea of the origin of our fear. Take full advantage of our strengths and opportunities. Design plans to overcome our weaknesses and neutralize the threats.

For instance, my best friend (a breathing bookworm tbh) always wanted to finish an English novel, which was supposed to help her with her English learning, she bought while she was traveling abroad but never did. She came to me for advice a couple of weeks ago and we listed something like this:

Strengths

· Desire to learn more

· Love for literature

· Decent grammar level

Weaknesses

· Limited vocabulary

· Inappropriate use of dictionary

· Procrastination

Opportunities

· Availability of materials, incld. self-help books, apps, videos and courses

· Friend as an English teacher

· Better English → possible promotion

Threats

· Limited time (frequent OT at work)

And it’s crystal clear that her amplified anxiety and the impending dilatoriness emanate from her conscious acknowledgement of her insufficient vocabulary, which is exacerbated by her morbid dependence on dictionary that powered her to look up for each and every new word or phrase whenever she came across one (sadly that’s the wrong direction). First thing first, her compulsive habit of using the dictionary while reading has to go away, rather, she should focus on the contexts to help her understand the meaning, even if it’s vague or sometimes wrong. Download a self-help app to enlarge her vocabulary, her goal being 50 words per day with punctual and regular reviews based on the curve of forgetting. To avoid the time conflict, she’ll read about two to three pages (about 200 pages in total) on the sub when she sets out for work, which takes her about three months to finish the entire book. And I’ll check in on her every now and then discussing the content she’d covered that day to make her more engaged. Guess what? She’s now 1/3 through the book she’d bought over 8 years ago.

· Planning Fallacy

What we have in common when it comes to the predictions about how much time will be needed to complete a future task is that we all display an optimism bias and underestimate the time needed, regardless of our previous experience of a past tasks of a similar nature that have taken longer to complete than generally planned. Consequently, we overestimate our capabilities in accomplishing the task within the deadline when we shouldn’t have, setting aside our mission and releasing the playful monkey till we’d pass the point of no return.

Solution: Refer to the time consumption of similar projects we had done before. Or simply ask for opinions from those who have related experience. Get into the habit of finishing in advance. Count incidents and interruptions into account and ensure that enough time is spared for their sake.

· Unidentified Classification

According to the four quadrants used by Dwight D. Eisenhower, things fall into four isolated categories, the Important & Urgent, the Important & Not Urgent, the Not Important & Urgent, and the Not Important & Not Urgent (see pic below). Our full acknowledgment of the issues that we’re dealing with decides their sequence on our to-do list.

Overcoming Procrastination

Solution: Apply the quadrants to our scheduling process, see if it changes the way we perceive things. 

· Undefined Identity

That’s a bigger issue holding us back coz defining who we are has always been one of the most infamous puzzles in philosophy, even the experts’ hope for an assertive answer might wither away. Our family doesn’t mark us, we are more than a father/mother, son/daughter, or grandchild. Our job doesn’t define us, we aren’t a doctor, lawyer, nor teacher. Nor do our appearance, gender, sexuality, age, income, education, and nationality. It isn’t the kind of answer that we can get from an encyclopedia or a Bible; it takes years of non-stop seeking. But that doesn’t mean we have to postpone everything we wanna do till we figure it out, coz we won’t have any clue till we start to do something first. So what’s the point of getting a clear idea of our identity in the battle against procrastination?

Solution: We aren’t born with an innate awareness of our identity, those who spot it at an early age are the blessed few to move faster towards their goal, while the rest of us are welcome to take a less satisfying but almost as effective answer by realizing our specific role in a specific circumstance. Our role in a certain event, to some degree, helps to rule out our misconducts. The more we are aware of our role and its corresponding responsibilities, the more likely we will be able to stop ourselves from temptation that’s out of scale with it. So try to live in the moment and play the role as we are supposed to. We all have or had a similar role as a student at some point. Being a student doesn’t mean that we have to produce amazing academic achievements, but we have to bury ourselves in the pursuit for something unknown to do a job of impersonating that role. Magically, we fall for the role we play once we find out that we’re actually pretty good at it, and that’s probably where the sentence “Fake it till we make it” comes from. Remember the killer experience we had in our very first job, being it part-time or full-time? It’s when we pretended to be the professionals (with sweaty hands or shaky leg or both, lol), right? And most of us ended up with satisfying result, didn’t we? We succeeded in fooling not only our boss and clients but also ourselves! That role-play saw our transformation from an amateur to a pro all the way through. Might as well try it if we’ve got nothing better.

· Unbiased Evaluation

Our identity shapes the way we assess things (can’t help it even if we are aware of the existence of such a cognitive bias), and the way we assess them determines the weight we put on them. And the given value affects our final decision, to do or not to do, whether it’s worthy of our time and energy, in return. We won’t be able to make anything that we don’t dare to think about come true. A chrysalis will never learn to fly if it hasn’t dreamt about transforming into a butterfly one day. In “The Life-changing Screen”, a popular report published by China Youth Daily, students from 248 schools that were located in the poverty-ridden areas were allowed to share the same class via the Internet with those studying in Chengdu No.7 High School, a renowned key school in Southwest China. What drew people’s attention was the distinguished evaluation systems students from two isolated regions used on their competence and potential. LIU Chengyan from Luquan No.1 High School in the remote countryside claimed that she wanted to be a math teacher in the future coz that was what she was told, while HE Qitian, a top student of the key school, preferred to pursue further study related to maths. Both being talented young people didn’t bring their interpretation any closer to each other. A bold hypothesis would be that they’d end up with different accomplishments in the field of mathematics based on their recognition of their future identity.

Solution: Try a more objective appraisal when our identity-oriented approach fails us. Rate the targeted issue on the full scale of its merits and demerits from a more base-on-the-fact and down-to-the-earth perspective, coz that makes it more measurable and reliable. Quantifying and visualizing the pros and cons, or sometimes the causes and effects, in terms of both short-term and long-term, will serve as a solid foundation for us to build on our decisions. Being pushed to look for more info and contemplate our future allows us, sometimes, to see things from a bigger picture with stronger guard against our own biases. Say learning English as a skill. The majority turned the proposal down not because it’s irrelevant with the obvious gain in communication skills, income increase and job promotion, but because they neglected the analysis and failed to see their potential in becoming more versatile talents who are able to smash the language barrier to get to a greater market and a better life. Instead of indulging ourselves in entertainments, our brain will actively mull over the distractions and our original plans once we’ve set up the bar.

· Overactive Sensitivity to Delay

Being sensitive to delay is natural coz we’re often driven by the time preference to place more emphasis than average on our well-being in the present and the immediate future, which explains our shortsightedness in regards of the future gains. That’s why the overweighted population can’t stop themselves consuming more calories than they should have even though they are in the middle of a weight-losing campaign and under strict diet control. They opt for what doesn’t seem logical without the awareness of their own unconscious mind because the perfect body shape in a beyond reaching (hence incredibly remote) future doesn’t sound tempting enough for them to say no to chocolates, cakes and fried chicken.

Solution: Bear in mind that what we’re set out to do isn’t peachy, dragging our feet along gets us nowhere. It takes persistent efforts. First, try to set shorter time period for our improvements. Second, envision the short-term benefits of the things we wanna do. Both steps help numb our sensitivity, which is sometimes the way out of misery. It’s said that cicadas have to endure their life cycles that can vary from one to nine or more years as underground larvae before their emergence above ground as adults. Living in the pitch-black underground for that long doesn’t weaken their will to bat their wings towards infinity. This is known as the law of cicada, which demonstrates the gravity of persistence, the power that lifts us up from fatigue or frustration. The same goes for Thomas Alva Edison, who was described as America’s greatest inventor. In 1878, Edison began working on a system of electrical illumination by tackling the problem of creating a long-lasting incandescent lamp, something that would be needed for indoor use. Rumors had it that he failed hundreds of thousands of times to figure out the right material for the first practical electric light bulb till he and his team discovered a carbonized bamboo filament that could last over 1,200 hours. However, he himself explained that the previous experiments were no enemies but partners who helped pave his way to the discovery of a perfect material.

· Tempting Instant Gratifications

Imagine that we are about to get to work, what would be inside our head? Snacks and junk food, TV series and movies, news and gossip, or the funny story our friend shared with us earlier? None of them are relevant to our study or work, but it’s insanely pleasant just thinking about them coz our feelings don’t have to synchronize with our actions. We don’t have to actually eat them, see them or talk about them to stimulate the dopamine released in our nucleus accumbens to feel happy, which is, in fact, a reinforced response to intensify our anticipation of the impending satisfaction. That doesn’t work in our favor coz it makes the instant gratifications more irresistible. As time passes by, our desire for them grows strong enough to take our mind off our projects. And so does our contentment when we finally get what we want. Unfortunately, the vicious cycle doesn’t stop there, even our conscious mind starts to fall victim to our desire and make up excuses to justify those distractions, leaving our intended issues up on the shelf.

Solution: Of course we can live like the monks or nuns, meditating and reflecting on our ideas till we figure out a way to control our desires, but that’ll make the temples and mountains pretty crowded. Suppressing or fighting our cravings doesn’t end well for us in most scenario cases coz it’s painfully exhausting. Hijacking the triggers and removing them away from us when we’re supposed to be concentrating on our work might be a better idea; after all, out of sight, out of mind. If we feel intrigued to reply to messages and emails that show up in the notification center whenever we see them, we should get off the grid or lock those electronic devices away, either in a drawer or a safe. When we’re alone with our thoughts, our performance multiplies coz we’re able to dive deeper into the maze. Wait and see the fascinating effect of solitude. Or we can spare 5-10 minutes during each section to check on them or enjoy our pure break, allowing our mind to recover from the burden every now and then.

· Unexpected Interrupts

Even if we manage to dodge the bullet from those immediate temptations, we aren’t safe from the unexpected interrupts. Say when I sat down in front of my laptop, ignoring the background noise in the cafe and trying to get my essay done, I got a call from the delivery guy in one minute, an urgent errand I had to take care of in another, and the signal from my stomach for meal later. As I was moving along with my writing, feeling all inspired, myriad thoughts about other topics swiftly dawned on me, forcing me to make the hard call of a temporary time-out till I’d noted them all down on my notebook. This is the kind of battle we go through everyday, everything’s screaming out loud for our attention and time—it feels like Pandora’s box is opened and all kinds of unmanageable problems leak out and turn our life into an epic mayhem. Feeling exhausted covering those unforeseen issues, we tend to be less motivated to resume our duties, coz it’s painful to see that we’ve been lagging behind.

Solution: Spare 10-30 seconds to mark the place or procedure and signify the direction that we intend to go when we leave for something else unless it’s matter of life or death. This makes it easier and faster for us to reconnect to our previous ideas to prevent further consumption of our limited time and energy, or in other words, makes us less likely to put off what we should have finished.

· Low Availability

This factor refers to the availability of the resources that we need to advocate our cause. Having easy access to all possibly beneficial materials and resources is a tremendous tonic for our morale. And it makes us itchy for what’s next, feeling pumped and ready to go. With the adrenaline rush, we incline to maintain more positive thoughts about what’s ahead, showing higher level of confidence in our competence and skills. Otherwise, we’d probably take it as a qualifiable excuse to avoid doing what we should do.

Solution: Stay close (physically) to the possible resources that we’re going to employ during the process. Obtaining them effortlessly gives us the impression that we’re moving smoothly in the right direction. And soon we’ll find ourselves working hard for the ultimate goal coz our time and energy is saved for the more demanding heavy lifting. If we are to write a piece of thesis paper or conduct a series of experiments, the first thing we have to do is to stay close to the library or lab where most of our work will take place. Being able to get our hands on the materials or data asap sends off the signal that we’re in charge of the whole thing, with an extra bonus in eliminating the chance that we get caught up somewhere along the process when our knowledge falls short. In contrast, those who claim that the library or lab is too far away from their dormitory never manage to produce a piece of decent work but the mediocre one they dash off right before the deadline.

· Lack of Feedback

An instant feedback system acts as the light that leads us to our destination; without it, we are doomed to walk hopelessly in the darkness, all senses depleted.

Solution: Ask for assessments and advices from a superior or a team, including our boss, professors, or partners. Record what we have done down to the smallest detail for further self-retrospection. Making all our efforts visualizable gives us a better idea about our own strengths and weaknesses. Establish the habit of reflecting on our work on a daily or weekly basis. It shouldn’t be any longer than that coz the longer we stall the less likely we will be able to move on and the less likely we will be to detect errors, which is gonna bite us in the ass later.