What’s Gotta Stay

Procrastination is such an easy thing to do, because you’re really not doing anything at all. By putting something off, you are usually just delaying the inevitable, and adding a nice coating of stress to go along with it. We all do it to some degree, some of us are just a lot better at it than others.

Think back to the glorious days of high school, while glorious may be pushing it a little too far release date back to high school when you add to write some of your first major term papers. Sure earlier in your education you had to use writing, but nothing like the big papers due in English class, history, or something like that. Did you put off writing and until the last possible moment? You may have started early doing some research with all the good intentions, but very likely you are a blight on that last night before it was due getting it done. I know I was! When it comes to writing papers I am the worst and putting it off at the last minute. I like to think I work best under pressure, but truth be told it’s just simple procrastination. If my memory serves me correctly, I think I finished my senior end of the year English paper at around 4 or 5 a.m. the day it was due.

So why do we do it? Papers aside, I’m talking about everyday life. What we put off important things as well as simple everyday things that we need to get done? Sure procrastination is easier at the moment, just putting things off, but in the end usually have to get a task done and realize that it would’ve been easier just to do it back when we were putting it off. My rational mind knows this, yet that is all I do at times when I am trying to avoid getting something done, rationalize.

Ever heard that definition for rationalize? “Rational – lies.” Yep, that’s all they are lies that we tell ourselves and convince ourselves that we are rational. Deep down we tell her solves these things, we know that they are not true or not in our best interest.

It’s so how do we break the cycle? How do we just get things done? Really the answer is simple, but for the true procrastinator you can be somewhat difficult. Some of you may know a man by the name of Spencer W. Kimball; he was a great leader in the LDS (Mormon) Church. He had a sign on his desk that simply read “Do It.” This is one of the mantras he lived by, and he taught others to do the same. This was well before Nike came out with the famous slogan “Just Do It,” and I often wondered if someone in their marketing department got their inspiration from Kimball.

The idea is simply when you have something you know you should do, and he likely won’t get done, simply do it. Rather than putting something off, especially if it is a small task that you may not feel like doing at the moment, change your thinking, make the time, and do it. You really may not feel at the moment like doing that task, but it is amazing the feeling you get when you have accomplished even a little thing right away rather than putting it off. It’s funny how you can get that little sense of accomplishment and how contagious it can be. When you get that one thing done and feel so industrious that you’ll start looking for another thing, in another.

I give you a rather funny example. At my office yesterday I fixed the leaky toilet downstairs. The toilet has been leaking for upwards of two months. At first it was not that big of a leak, happening from the point at which the water pipe enters the tank. We threw a bucket under it and call the landlord to let another was a problem. Much to our surprise we found that our contract included a provision that the toilet was our responsibility. For several weeks the bucket was enough to deal with the problem if it was emptied periodically, but eventually the bucket had to be trained once a day than multiple times a day. There were many of us in the office that could fix the toilet, we were simply just putting it off. Who knows, perhaps some people were hoping either someone else would fix it, just not them.

Yesterday I finally went out and got the part which ended up being only six dollars. Yes, it really broke the bank. Actually the biggest hurdle was probably just me remembering to bring the right tools with me to work. In the end it took me only 10 minutes to swap out the part make sure it was tight, and put on the water again. Yep, and I was pretty proud of myself. Actually I have fixed toilets in the past, so I knew it wasn’t a big job; as I said before, I was simply putting it off. After weeks of emptying the bucket, cleaning the floor periodically, and generally dealing with the mess that was created by the leak I finally fixed it. How much easier would have been had I just fixed it in the first week that we noticed the leak?

There are plenty of things in our everyday lives much like this leaky toilet that we are simply putting off that could be done in a matter of minutes if we would just “Do It.” So here’s my challenge, make a list of some of the things that you are putting off. They may be home-improvement, they may be personal improvement, or they may just be tasks related to work or your personal life that you would like to get done and also the off this list. That don’t cheat and not putting the left that you would prefer just to keep putting off!

To begin with make a list of the first five things that come to mind. Now assign a number, one to five to these items in the order of the priority you would like to see them. Over the next five days, starting tomorrow if you really want to, (and you are not just doing that for the sake of procrastinating!), but even better starting today knock out one of these tasks per day. Don’t feel limited to just one item if there are a few things that you can get done, but follow this principle in general. By getting one of these things done each day perhaps first thing in the morning, you will start to develop the habit of just getting things done. It’s a good feeling, and you’ll be amazed at how many little things you can just get done if you follow this simple advice to just “Do It.”