The Relevance of Procrastination

It's easy to remain seduced by the idea that putting off (important) tasks is a problem to be solved. If you had sufficient willpower and energy, if you lived in a different city, if you had access to a million dollars, perhaps you would get on with the things you are supposed to do, and give uninterrupted devotion to them. But the reality is: to be, and to do, is, by definition, to engage procrastination.

Say X is an important activity, Y is not so important but it is essential, and Z is not important at all. To do X is to procrastinate doing Y, and vice versa. The same is applicable with Z. Denouncers of procrastination would argue you devote all your time to X. This is all well and good until you need to do Y. When you get to doing Y, because you must, you might find yourself play host to guilt and anxiety because of a belief you should spend all you time doing X.

The bottom line is, at any given time, you are always procrastinating something. Doing X, implies not working on everything else. So what if the question wasn't how do you stop procrastinating but what are you comfortable procrastinating?

Your framing is everything.

Procrastination only ever becomes relevant at the discomfort it invites  - the discomfort that comes accompanied with the self talk that: you are supposed to be doing X, but you are here doing Y. To probe at the discomfort is to come upon judgements about value. 

As posited in Why You Keep Procrastinating (And What to Do About It), resistance lies at the heart of forgoing the important in favour of the less important and/or unimportant, and effort is the currency required to unravel yourself from the hold of resistance. To dissolve the discomfort of procrastination is to get comfortable with deciphering your judgements about value and applying effort to meet those judgements. 

So at points, when you find yourself host to the discomfort of procrastination, don't ask, how do I stop procrastinating, instead realise the discomfort it has brought along and probe that. The problem worth solving lies not with your tendency to put off tasks but with your tendency get comfortable with to unpacking the discomfort putting off tasks brings along.