Handling Procrastination

Why procrastinating?

Most of the time procrastination is caused by the lack of power of will to do something. This is mostly due to the fact that the thing you’re thing to do is too overwhelming so you just resorted to doom-scrolling and doing other non-productive things.

Inertia

Inertia is the natural tendency of objects in motion to stay in motion and objects at rest to stay at rest, unless a force causes the velocity to change. It is one of the fundamental principles in classical physics, and described by Isaac Newton in his first law of motion (also known as The Principle of Inertia)… See more

It plays a role in procrastination. The hardest part of doing something is to actually start doing it. A stationary object needs a force to start moving. It needs an inertia. If the object you’re trying to move is big, it will also need a bigger inertia.

Basically, to break procrastination, we need to break inertia.

Solution

Reduce the stakes

Make it as easy as possible to start out something. Make smaller goals at the start. For example, instead of trying to write 500 words essay, try making it 50 words.

2 Minutes Rule

If you don’t want to do something, try to only do it for 2 minutes. For example, cleaning your room while also listening a music, once the music stops, stop cleaning the room.

These solutions should break the inertia because objects in motion, stay in motion. Most likely you will not stop after writing 50 words, or after 2 minutes of music. This is because you broke the inertia, you started moving, you feel like you’re in the zone and you need to finish it. This momentum will keep going over and over.

TL;DR

Make smaller goals to get started, the main point here is to just get started and stop overthinking. The momentum will keep you moving.