Procrastination deficit
I'm an avid procrastinator.
My mind would trick me every single time. It'd make me feel hungry even when I wasn't, just so I could postpone doing the dishes. Or it'd make me believe I'd enter a state of hyper-productivity after taking a shower.
It looks like this is something every human experiences to a certain degree. Steven Pressfield expands this beautifully in the book The War of Art.
As ridiculous as it may sound, I play tricks on my mind as well. Here's one trick I've never seen before.
| Activity | Previous heaviness | Estimated heaviness | Actual heaviness |
|---|---|---|---|
| Take out the trash and walk the dog | 5 | 4 | 3 |
| Walk the dog | 3 | 2 | 2 |
| Load the dishwasher and put away dishes | 5 | 4 | 4 |
| Walk the dog | 2 | 0 | 1 |
| Make dinner (meat in sauce) | 6 | 4 | 5 |
| Put away charger and walk the dog | 3 | 1 | 1 |
| Get up to grab the camera | 1 | 1 | 0 |
I rate the task based on:
- How heavy it feels before even starting it.
- How I think it'll feel right after completing it.
- How it actually felt when it's done.
And there are only two rules:
- After rating how heavy the task feels and your prediction, you have no other choice than move on to the task.
- After you complete the task, you have to give it the last rating.
It works great for me with tasks under 20 minutes. I haven't tried it with longer ones, but I guess it'd be a matter of dividing the project into these 20-minute tasks.
The point of writing down the task and rating it is no other than making myself conscious of how hard it'd be, instead of just letting my brain go into primitive mode to save some calories.
The cool thing is that you don't have to wait too long to see the effects. After a few tasks, you find yourself giving more realistic ratings and thinking, "well, actually it's not that hard."