Why Do I Procrastinate So Much? Real Reasons & How to Stop

Why do you procrastinate so much and what can you do about it? Do you find that putting back things for later has become one of the defining parts of your personality? So much so, that it negatively affects your personal & work life?

If this description fits you, continue reading on to find out the real reasons, as well as the best solutions for this nagging problem.

You’re over confident in your abilities

Sometimes, one of the main reasons for putting back writing that essay or starting to exercise is your confidence. When I say that it’s your confidence, I mean that you truly believe that you can achieve your target on time. Or in this case at the very last minute. You think that you’re so good, that you can finish it really fast and exactly on time.

The problem though is, obviously that you’re putting yourself under a lot of unwanted stress by pushing yourself into a corner unnecessarily.

If you find yourself putting things back because you’re overconfident, try the following. Challenge and question yourself: “If you’re so confident, do it, finish it and show me now. In the following time frame (e.g. one hour) do what you say that you can and show me.” Push yourself to get started and finish off what you planned.

You will find this trick to be quite rewarding. This is, considering that you have bucked the trend of putting things for later. And for having had the willpower to not procrastinate & complete the job much earlier than so many times before.

If you could repeat this method every time you feel like putting things back for later, you can gradually create a new habit and say goodbye to procrastination for good!

You’re too afraid to fail

On the flip side to the previous point, sometimes the reason you procrastinate is the fear of failure. This is quite normal, given how you can be a bit anxious especially when starting something new.

You might be afraid of underperforming a task. Or in a fitness related scenario, that you won’t be able to lose or gain your target amount of weight. Or that you might not be able to get to the kind of quality that you want to achieve on an art project.

While those are all valid human thoughts, we must understand that to fail is also a step in the right direction. You must keep in mind that failing at something is far better than not trying. The brave fail at times but then come off at the top one day. The meek never try to start with, so they neither fail nor achieve anything substantial.

So, what you need to do the next time you’re uncertain on how things will end, just start. That’s it, that is the first step. Just start on what you want to do. Keep going at it one step at a time. Improve yourself even in spite of failures. And soon you will reach your goals.

You’re Lazy

If you procrastinate because you’re lazy, you might have a much bigger problem. This is because you lack motivation to start with. Although procrastination & laziness can look similar, they actually are not.

Procrastination is to have the will to do, but pushing it back for later. Laziness is about not wanting to do something in the first place.

To get out of being lazy, you need to find your life’s real purpose and find what you’re truly passionate about. And then choose a career, hobbies etc. based on that.

It has turned into a habit

Pushing back things for later can be due to your innate nature to procrastinate. Or it can be that you have unknowingly cultivated the habit of procrastinating itself.

What was a mild problem of putting things back once in a while in the past, has now become a routine occurrence. This is due your mind forming this bad habit over time making it part of your character.

To get over this, you need to reverse engineer your learned habit by holding yourself accountable & getting started on things on time, as scheduled. You must not make excuses or yield your will to minor distractions. Instead, begin the task and continue until it’s finished.

You get distracted Easily

If you have difficulty focusing on one thing at a time, you will find it challenging to begin a task. Not only that, with the constant interruptions, you will take more time than needed to complete the task as well. This is the epitome of what means to procrastinate.

In the current environment we live in, there are plenty of distractions going on. Your phone being one of the main culprits. Every sound, notification or lack thereof, makes you want to reach and interact with your smartphone.

Once you take the device in to your hand and start scrolling, it would be a hard guess to know how long it will take before you keep it down again. You can say the same thing about the short time it takes for you to pick up the phone again for the slightest reason.

There is so much new information in your phone, that keeps updating, that your brain enjoys it to the extent of it being an addiction. If you’re unable to go without fiddling your phone for half an hour, you need to strongly consider having it in another room on silent mode.

Being a Perfectionist

In some cases, individuals who identify themselves as perfectionists are more prone to be serial procrastinators. When you want the results to be perfect, you don’t want to leave any room for any faults.

When you set your targets to an almost unattainable level of perfection, it is no wonder that you keep waiting for the “right” time & circumstances to start. Your expectations of perfectionism are freezing you in your tracks.

Hence. you will procrastinate for the following reasons:

Over preparing and analyzing every detail in theory

Planning ahead and researching beforehand is definitely a good thing. But when you spend an excessively huge amount of time on it instead of getting started, that is where the problem lies. The key to progress is to get started and then keep working on it as you go.

Waiting for the right time to start

As for whatever reason, right now isn’t a good time to start given the height of perfectionism you want to achieve. You want to start it at the best time possible, which is especially not right now. Again, do not wait, the best time to start is right now.

The fear of letting yourself down

This is why it is better to focus on progress instead of perfectionism. Perfectionism puts too much weight on you, but progress a step by step process to the ideal outcome. When you strive for perfectionism, it comes with fear, which might make you delay starting on it.

Wasting time doubting yourself

Again, because the ideal is too high you might be afraid of not being able to meet your own lofty standards. This doubt will keep you away from starting for as long as possible.

You expect every step of the task to go as planned.

And you’re afraid of it not going as planned. In anticipation of this, you put things on hold, setting them aside to complete it “later”.

Thinking about how things will go right or wrong in theory

Instead of working on the task step by step, you might again over analyze and theorize on how things will or will not go. Theory is all good, but there is nothing like doing the work and going step by step to your goal. Progress is the key.

The best way for you to avoid this crippling situation is to not strive for perfectionism, but to getting things completed & improving yourself incrementally. It should always be progress over perfection.

Whatever it maybe you’re doing, you should only compare your progress, to where you were in the past. Ask yourself the question: “Have I made progress in the things I do, as I have planned?”. Based on the answer you give yourself; you will need to either, change course completely or fix a few things where you need improvement & keep going forward.

You shift your focus to other menial tasks

In a bid to trick your brain in to saying that “I’m not procrastinating”, you might act busy doing other non-essential stuff. I mean, these are things that can really be done later, with no hurry whatsoever, but you still actively choose to do them.

This acts as a coping mechanism to convince yourself that you’re doing something, while making an excuse to delay starting on the actual task at hand.

In Conclusion

Everyone tends to procrastinate from time to time to different degrees. But you should always be aware of when it becomes a problem and effects both your personal & professional life.

What hacks do you use to get out of this bad habit of putting things back for later? Share your thoughts in the comments section below. If you found the article to be useful, please share it on your favorite social media platforms using the buttons below.