Why do I procrastinate so much?

What is procrastination?

The word comes from the Latin pro, meaning forward or in favour of, and crastinus, meaning of tomorrow, so it literally means the pushing of things on to another day.

Most people assume procrastination is a matter of laziness or poor time management, but it very often works as a protection mechanism. Your subconscious mind may be using it to keep you away from a fear of failure, a fear of success, perfectionism, a past traumatic experience, or expectations that have grown so large they feel impossible to meet. Whichever it is, some part of you has concluded that not starting is safer than starting, and it will defend that position with surprising stubbornness.

What happens in the brain

When you sit down to a task you have been avoiding, the amygdala, your brain's fear centre, can switch on and trigger the fight, flight or freeze response. Stress hormones flood the system, your thinking clouds over, decisions become harder than they should be, and you feel emotionally swamped. The obvious way out of that discomfort is to avoid the task, which is why you find yourself checking your phone, scrolling over and over, or perhaps engaged in seemingly useful but non-urgent task like wiping down the kitchen surfaces. The avoidance is itself more procrastination, and so the cycle keeps feeding itself.

Why the obvious tools often fail

To-do lists, time management apps, productivity techniques and sheer willpower are all sensible enough, and some people get on very well with them. For many others they fail, because they address only the conscious mind while the real driver sits underneath it. Repainting a wall with damp behind it gives you a similar result: it looks fine for a few weeks, and then the stain comes back through.

Where these patterns come from

There are several common subconscious patterns that drive procrastination, such as:

• Early experiences, i.e. programming we learnt in childhood, such as from critical parents, teachers, high pressure academic environments, traumatic experiences or perfectionist role models

• Early abandonment and self-worth issues leaving you feeling unworthy of success and using self-protective avoidance

• Critical environments which create a fear of rejection and achievement anxiety

While these may create patterns of behaviour and limiting beliefs, these can be adapted with a little effort, time and sometimes therapy.

Start with the feeling rather than the diary

Sometimes procrastination is caused by dysregulation of emotion regulation. We put things off because the task stirs up something unpleasant. It follows that procrastination can be reduced by getting better at handling those feelings, and the strategies can be applied directly to the unpleasant task in front of you.

The aim is to tolerate, accept and gradually change the way you relate to the uncomfortable emotion, and there are several ways of going about it. Hypnosis, self-hypnosis, mindfulness and progressive relaxation all help. Crucially, so do restorative activities that leave you feeling replenished, and anything that builds your self-esteem. It is also worth reminding yourself of the resources you already have, such as past successes, your skills and knowledge, and the people who support you.

Ask a different question

Try not to dwell on what you don't want to do, because that keeps your mind circling the very thing you are avoiding. If you say to yourself, “I don’t want to procrastinate” you have simply repeated the word “procrastinate” to your subconscious. Instead, ask what you would be doing right now if you were not procrastinating, and picture it properly, including how it feels to be in that version of your day.

Turn the order around

Many of us hold a firm belief that rest and enjoyment have to be earned by finishing the things we should be doing first. If procrastination stops us doing the shoulds, though, we never reach the wants either, and we end up in a dismal loop of guilt, shame and inactivity with no real rest and no real progress. So turn the order on its head! Do something you enjoy first, and enjoy it without guilt, then turn to the thing you have been putting off. You will usually find you come to it calmer and better resourced than you would have done by white-knuckling your way through.

Break it down

If you had to run a marathon for the first time, with no training, that 26 miles would feel impossible. So when you train, you break your goal in smaller chunks. And if you were building a house, you wouldn’t expect to get the roof up on the first day, you would plan the building project over weeks. Similarly, long to do lists can feel really daunting, so start with one item on the “should do” list and one item on your “want to do list”. You can then enjoy the satisfaction from having got started and continue in measured steps.

How hypnotherapy can help

Because so much procrastination is driven from below the surface, hypnotherapy is a natural way of working with it, since it reaches the subconscious patterns that willpower and planners cannot. A typical approach includes:

• a relaxation induction, to lower defensive emotional states and settle the threat response

• exploring the root causes, if necessary, which may well go back to childhood

• reframing tasks as opportunities rather than threats

• future pacing and visualisation, so that success and completion begin to feel familiar and safe, and even exciting

• positive suggestions for motivation, focus and action

• building self-efficacy and emotional regulation, so that you trust yourself to cope when things feel uncomfortable

Much of the work lies in bringing your conscious and subconscious goals into line. Consciously you want to finish the project, launch the business or send the email, but if a part of you is convinced that doing so is dangerous (for example) that part will win every time until it has been heard and reassured.

Hypnotherapy can help you to find out what the procrastinating part is trying to protect you from and to help it find a safer and more useful way of doing its job.

Procrastination is not a character flaw. It is a sign that some part of you feels under threat, and once you see it that way there is little point in berating yourself and a good deal to be gained from working with yourself instead.

If you would like some support with stopping procrastination and getting on with your life, please do get in touch and we can arrange a session.