As human beings, we would all love to live a no worry life like our household pets where we sleep and eat all day. Unfortunately, we live in a society where in order to survive, one must be act like an adult and make a living somehow. Long gone are the days of no expenses, no stress, and no worries like the good ol’ college days. The person you are today is usually shaped by how you were brought up and the influences of your friends and even perhaps the media. With that said, we all fall victim to bad habits, some worst than others but we all have one habit that can lead us to failure and it is: procrastination.
As the late Steve Jobs once said, entrepreneurs are rebels, misfits, troublemakers, or crazy ones. So it should be no surprise that almost all of us hated going to class back in high school or college if you attended. You may remember those ‘fun’ all nighters you did when you underestimated the scope of an assignment or paper. This habit of procrastination is not surprising since naturally we’d rather play than work.
But as an entrepreneur, your sense of urgency must change in order for you to put your life and ambitions in perspective. The longer you delay, the less action you take, and the less action you take, the slower you progress. For every moment you take off, you can be damned sure that there’s someone else out there, out working and out hustling you. Afterall, we all work in the confines of the same 24 hours in a day so it should be no excuse as to why you choose to procrastinate.
We get it. You’d rather browse Facebook or Instagram. Maybe even play some Call of Duty or Grand Theft Auto for hours upon hours. That’s the problem with distractions so you must make a valiant effort to minimize them but reward yourself after accomplishing a major task. Overcoming procrastination isn’t actually that difficult but rather a matter of having an agenda, performing those tasks, reaching specific milestones, and in turn setting the wheels in motion for being proactive.
Take a minute to think of what you need to accomplish. If you look at the big picture, it may seem too large to tackle thus causing you to delay and re-evaluate the situation. Instead, divide up what you need to do across several days with hard deadlines. Each deadline reached is another item to cross off your list. As you cross off items, you will begin to reach significant milestones that will positively grow your business and improve your personal life. When life is full of good news, you tend to ride that high and keep moving with velocity thus becoming proactive.
We understand that habits are habits and some are hard to break (like smoking), but realize that procrastination serves no benefit to yourself and basically will stall your development. Put yourself accountable for where you want to be and make sure that each and every action you take helps you become who you want to become.
