"I went from -being a terrible procrastinator burdened by that awful feeling of extreme guilt and shame which leads to the self deprecating spiral of thoughts one encounters from putting off stuffs- to -a better version of myself-"
In a bid to avoid a clumsy post and for the purpose of understanding, this write-up would be separated into two different posts, so be sure to leave a follow to not miss out on the second part"
If you're prone to putting off stuffs for tomorrow when you definitely could do them today, right now. You may be a bit of a procrastinator. Everyone has done it once or twice. Hey...you're probably doing it now, yes! Exactly you guessed right. I mean sometimes it's just more comfortable to spend some time streaming your favorite series than to actually get started on that project which might be a bit intimidating. I find that it's very easy to tell a procrastinator "Since you're aware of it, just stop then". I mean, sometimes we do scream this in frustration. But sadly we find ourselves putting things off once again and over and over till we literally just concede and in a bid to feel less gross about ourselves do that annoying self pacifying thingy "It's human nature after all".
Why do we procrastinate?
It's easy, it's just laziness right?
Except it isn't!
I find that the major conceptions vacillate between "willpower" and "laziness". Although partly right, it isn't sufficient enough an answer. I went ahead to do my research and confirmed my ideas.Here's what an actual procrastination cycle looks like by the way. This clearly explains the process.
Back to "why do we procrastinate". There are actually many factors at play so its dynamism makes it difficult to proffer a definite factor due to the reason being we can't study each in isolation. However, I won't go ahead and start listing them...that's boring. Instead I picked the one which I feel greatly influences the process, which brings me to my next question.
Imagine a scenario where you are faced with a threat, say a tiger. You are staring at each other, you in shock and fright and the tiger intently, trying to secure it's next meal. Immediately it makes a move what do you do? RUN!! Of course you would
Now pause for a moment. We only procrastinate when we find that a task is unpleasant or unappealing, frustrating, causes anxiety or is just boring in one word. I never turn down a "hey Emmanuêl, wanna play some fortnite" during my spare time. But an "hey Emmanuêl, let's go do some calculus... I hear we might have a test soon" doesn't sound half as good so I'm definitely going to make up an excuse to avoid that. Why?...it sounds boring(results may differ based on personalities).
Let's take a dive back to our current situation "the tiger". Come to think of it, having to run from one sure seems like a lot of work and energy. Definitely not something I'd wanna do for fun. So why do we not stop and think and probably judge the situation in the moment?
This is an exaggerated example of cases where the tendency to procrastinate are terminated and would be discussed at length in the second part.
For now, let's examine the reason or dominant reason why we procrastinate
Here we go
Are you ready for this?
I mean you might have probably seen this
Really?
Ok....
Why don't we just put this off
Are you sure we can't do this later?
Alright then :)...
Here we go
There's a part of the brain, forebrain to be exact known as the "Amygdala" or as I like to call it "lizard brain" which is a part of the brain's limbic system involved in emotional and fear response. It's basically your survival mechanism scanning your environment from anything that might be or you may consider a threat. Immediately it detects something it releases hormones that allow you to flee t avoid the attack.
Let's cut the nerd talk.
The lizard brain exists to get us to run away or avoid danger and natural uncomfortable situations. So as a procrastinator being faced with a particular task he/she considers boring or unpleasant as usual. This emotional response becomes rooted in the limbic system which in turn motivates us emotionally to avoid. That's human nature " . According to Dr. Tim Pychyl
"We avoid to feel better"
"We face all kinds of internal threats, but our Amygdala can't really tell the difference between those and an attacking leopard,"
"Your body recognizes the task you're avoiding as a threat, it creates anxiety, and your natural reaction is the same fight-or-flight which it would in nature: to get away from the threat. The problem is that this isn't a tiger that's going to eat you, and getting away from the task is only going to make it worse."
This is also responsible for many bad decision you've probably made including those plans you didn't go through with for fear of failure. When these fears sprouts, in the same vein the lizard brain considers the decision/ plan/ course of action you want to go ahead with as a threat and doing its job in an attempt to protect you looks for reasons why you shouldn't venture into such.
This is where questions such as
What if it doesn't work out
What if it falls through
Do I really want to do this
What if I lose it all
What ifs! what ifs!! what ifs!!!
Alright, it's getting too lengthy and you're probably losing interest so I'll lay my pen here.
Stay safe
Doppley...
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