Reason 1. You Haven't Really Committed to Doing the Job
When I teach a workshop for would-be and beginning novelists, I often start by asking why they want to write a novel. Such an extended project demands a huge commitment of time, energy, and emotion, after all. Most of the answers I get fall into one of three categories.
The first reason, simply stated, is that the writer feels good while writing (or, conversely, feels wretched when denied the opportunity to write). For some, writing seems to be almost an addiction or a compulsion, although a relatively harmless one.
The second set of reasons basically cluster around the notion of communication and storytelling: "I have something to say, and a novel seems to be the best way to say it," or "I've got a story I want or need to tell." I've even heard folks say that the story seems to be using them to get itself told.
The third set of reasons stems from the notion, sadly mistaken, that novelists become rich and famous with relatively little effort. Many of the folks in this group don't want to write a novel; they want to have written a novel, so they can reap the supposed rewards.
Most of the folks in the first category and many in the second actually go on to write that novel. Few in the third group ever do.
Occasionally I get a reason that doesn't fall into any of these categories.
"My English teacher back in good old P.S. 134 said I'd make a good novelist," one might say, or "Folks in my book group think my life story would be inspirational."
Assuming that they aren't being coy, that they don't really mean "I think I'd make a great novelist," or "I think my life story would be inspirational," my response to this sort of reason borders on Mom's old admonition: "If somebody told you to jump off a cliff, would you do it?"
The key here is the source of the motivation. We generally don't need to prioritize or otherwise force or trick ourselves into performing actions that are internally motivated. But the more the motivation comes from the English teacher or the book club or the mate or the boss or any other external source, the less likely we are to do it.
Know anybody who got into the family bakery business, or became a lawyer, or joined the Marines because somebody expected or demanded it? If so, you probably know an unhappy baker or lawyer or Marine.
You may chronically put off an activity because you aren't really sold on doing it at all. Reasons include:
If that's the case, you need to answer two fundamental questions:
The first question may redirect and increase your motivation. You're no longer doing it because someone said you ought to. You're doing it to impress a boss, help a friend, make money, or get to a task you really enjoy.
The second question is the negative of the first. Your motivation may become avoidance of something unpleasant, like a lousy job evaluation, an angry, alienated spouse, or a disappointed child, for example.
If you can find no internal motivation--no benefit for doing the job and no penalty for not doing it, you may well decide not to do it at all.
Even if you can see a benefit to doing the job, you may still decide that the costs in time and energy (and the other things you aren't doing) outweigh the benefits. In that case you can:
1. Do what you have to do to get out of the job. That's not the same thing as simply putting it off. This is a definitive decision not to do it and to accept the consequences, if any. In the long run, that sort of decision costs less, in time and stress, than does the passive resistance of procrastination.
Or
2. Do it anyway--but for your own reasons.
Reason 2. You're Afraid of the Job
This is a hard thing for many of us to admit--to ourselves let alone to someone else. But it may be what's keeping you from doing a job you need and want to accomplish. If you can identify your reluctance as fear and track it to its source, you can deal with the fear and get on with the job. Here are three of the most common varieties of performance anxiety:
Consider the student who never studies and flunks out. He can always tell himself, "If I had studied, I would have passed the stupid course." But what if he had studied--and still failed?
For most of us, "won't" is a lot easier to deal with than "can't." If you don't try it, you don't have to confront the possibility that you can't do it.
On the other hand, if you do pass the course, folks will expect you to do it again, or to go out and get a job, or to apply what you've learned. If you never try, you'll never have to face the consequences of success, either.
"If I pass the course, I'll graduate. If I graduate, I'll . . ." You'll what?
If you don't pass the course, you'll never have to find out what happens next.
If you never write the novel, you'll never have to know whether a publisher would have accepted it.
If you don't finish basic training, you'll never have to know whether you could have really hacked it in the military.
Sometimes the not knowing seems more acceptable than the possible consequences of finding out for sure. But how sad to let such fears prevent you from ever trying.
Identify the fear. Give it a name and confront it. Imagine the consequences of your actions or non-actions as objectively as you can.
The fear won't go away. But if the goal is worth pursuing, you'll be able to act despite the fear.
Reason 3. You Don't Place a High Enough Priority on the Activity
You're sold on the idea that somebody ought to do the task. You'll even agree, if pressed, that you're the person to do it. You may even want to do it.
You just don't want or need to do it enough, and you always want or need to do something else more.
Thus, the poor task--cleaning the leaves out of the rain gutters in autumn, to cite one mundane example--keeps getting bumped down the list, below other, more pressing jobs. You've got to go grocery shopping first, because you won't have anything to eat if you don't. You've got to mow the lawn first, because it will look awful if you don't. (And nobody can see the leaves in the rain gutters, after all.)
This sort of procrastination problem may eventually work itself out. As the other tasks get done, those leafy gutters work their way up the list. Or the problem may take on a higher priority after the first hard rain of the season.
Establishing priorities is subjective, especially when dealing with activities that are neither urgent nor particularly important relative to other activities. Take a look at the job that just isn't getting done and see if you can redefine it in terms of the ultimate benefit you'll receive for doing it.
First time through, this definition may be negative:
"If I don't clean out the rain gutters, I'll get a flood in the garden the first time it rains hard."
Positive motivations tend to be much stronger. Recast it in the positive form:
"If I clean out the rain gutters, I'll protect my garden from flooding."
Is that important to you?
Are there other ancillary benefits to getting the task done?
Are these considerations enough to move the task up the list? If so, get at it! But if not, you must either resign yourself to living with the consequences of your non-action or find a way to get the job done without actually having to do it. You could hire the neighbor kid, thus trading money for time, for example. Or, you could add "It won't cost anything if I do it myself" to your list of ancillary benefits, perhaps tipping the balance in favor of doing it.
Reason 4. You Don't Know Enough to Do the Task
When I get "writer's block," it's often my subconscious mind's helpful way of suggesting that I don't really know what the hell I'm talking about.
This is true for other sorts of motivational blocks as well. You may simply not know enough to do the job right. You haven't consciously recognized or admitted this to yourself, but you know it deep down, and this knowledge is manifesting itself in strong aversion.
Gather the information you need. If all else fails, read the directions (a desperate last resort for many of us). Then plunge into the task.
Learn to discern between the legitimate need to gather information and a stalling mechanism whereby reading the book or going to talk to the guy at the hardware store is simply a way to put off confronting the job. If your problem is "lack of want to" rather than lack of information, you'll need a different strategy, namely, what to do when…
Reason 5. You Just Plain Don't Wanna!
On a preference scale of 1 to 10, giving Rover his flea bath rates a minus 2.
It isn't merely unpleasant. It isn't just disgusting. It's downright dangerous. Rover does not like his flea bath. Last time you tried this little experiment in torture, you wound up scratched, Rover was traumatized, and the bathroom looked like a tidal wave had hit it.
The fleas are back. Rover is scratching. If you don't do something, and fast, you'll have fleas all over the house.
You've got two choices, and you don't need a book on time management to tell you what they are:
Get on the old raincoat, put a tarp down around the tub, and pop Rover into the suds. Or make an appointment with your friendly neighborhood dog groomer.
Identify the reason for the procrastination. Confront your attitudes and fears. Weigh the consequences.
Then deal with it!