I think I have said quite a bit about procrastination in the last few blogs, so I might just close up for the time being with some ideas and tips to help with this problem. Others have also good ideas and I have added some links down at the end of this for you to visit and enlarge your reading. And no, I am not promoting anyone else, just giving you some more ideas.
The first thing anyone who wants to at least get a handle on procrastination has to understand that EVERYONE in the world, from Sir Richard Branston to President Barak Obama has procrastinated at some part in their life. So you aren't alone. The lady who is immaculately dressed and made-up, with her kids looking like they stepped out of some glittery magazine has, so don't beat yourself up about it. This lady may be able to afford designer dresses and have a nanny for each child, but she still has the same amount of time as you in a day.
And that is twenty-four hours.
So you don't really need to manage time. What you really need to manage is YOU.
Learn the tricks of self-management. Instead of waiting for that extra cup of coffee to cool and reading the paper, make it and while it is cooling, rinse the plates. If you are someone who enjoys scalding-hot beverages, then use the time the kettle is boiling to rinse the plates. You have all day to read the paper/ talk on the phone/catch up with Facebook.
Make yourself some notes the night before and leave them where you can see them, not first thing, while you are still shaking the sleep out of your head, but very soon afterwards. Most of us can estimate or rather guesatimate, how long it takes to get the kids out of the house of a morning. Holidays are an exception. If your husband can't get himself out of the house mostly by himself, then educate him. Is is the days of sharing, after all. Either buy shirts that do not need ironing or teach him to do so. Or outsource the ironing and provide a little bit of income for someone else.
Screeds of paper everywhere on sticky notes and post-its are fine, but after a while, they become just part of the furniture if they are continually the same colour. So make your lists on different colours for each day. That simple trick will startle your eyes, which are accustomed to the green/yellow/blue notes you stuck there yesterday.
Don't put too many tasks on the notes or you are sunk before you start. And don't make them marathons either. I personally like to be extremely specific on what I plan, so it does not fall victim to both procrastination and exhaustion, although you haven't even started. Cleaning a cupboard from top to bottom for instance is broken down into clean one drawer and sort junk from it into piles to throw out/give away/keep at a time.I find the optimum number of tasks I can exert myself to complete in a day is about five. This does not leave me stressed, frustrated, or any of the other negatives. But I have a system in place, as well as the one below.
Use bribes. It works for quite a lot of the population, so why not you? Promise yourself to read the paper/phone that friend/check Facebook, but choose only one, after you have finished each task. Often the enjoyment of having actually finished something on your list can be enough and inspire you to go further on with what you are doing, instead of commencing your next task.
Don't.
That euphoria will be short-lived and make it twice as hard to start the next task, which should be entirely different, or derail what you did plan in the first place. Instead, savor the feeling and give yourself that reward. This can be added incentive for the next job. Depending on the size of the closet, schedule one drawer for every day of the week, At the end of the week, you should have a clean closet with a great deal of unneeded stuff removed.
Two pieces of advice that I really have found valuable are: to break the task into tiny bite-size pieces, and anything that I have not worn for more than a year/ keep for sentimental reasons only/ really has hit its use-by date has to go. If I have not worn it for a year, chances are I am never going to be thin enough again to wear it/ I'll be far too old or it will be when it comes around in fashion again, so stop deluding yourself. Besides, you can always free-up some more closet space for new clothes!
Breaking the job up may not result in a sparkling clean closet in one day, but hey! Rome wasn't built in a day either. If you look at it from the side of 'It doesn't look any different', then that leaves a gap for disappointment and disillusionment to move in and completely derail everything. If you must, admire the clean drawer, ignore the rest of the mess and slam the door until the next time, or whenever you have scheduled an assault for later on.
Okay, on with those links I have inspected. They may just give you further ideas.
www.marcandangel.com/.../7-common-causes-and-proven-.
www.pickthebrain.com/blog/procrastination-4-causes-and-cures/
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