Fighting procrastination!

One of the key things I’m looking forward to resolving in the course of the year is procrastination. I hate it when I procrastinate. It’s so bad that I even feel guilty taking a nap during the day. Does anyone else feel like this? I keep thinking about how time is passing by whenever I sleep. Here is how I intend to break the habit of procrastination in order to make my time more valuable:

Finding my focus.

I’m finding that it’s not so much about procrastination but more about organization. It’s so much easier to focus on something when you have something to focus on. When you set goals for yourself, you are able to know whether you’re achieving them or not. As much as I hate planning I’m learning that it’s so important to plan. If you’re like me, you’re probably thinking planning is a task in itself. I get that but I think once you’re able to get yourself to start planning, you’ll get used to it and you’ll find yourself a lot more organized. Most importantly, please get yourself a diary. I can’t say that I utilized the one I had for the previous year properly, since I’m so bad at jolting things down ahead of time; Though, I find that whenever I wrote things down I actually got to do them. The thing is I’m more likely to do weekly/monthly updates on my diary depending on what it is I’m doing at the time rather than having to think of sitting down to plan a whole year. Therefore, working in stages should help me a lot. Additionally, setting up themes help direct my thoughts in terms of creativity. It gives me something to focus on when I’m working and it gives my work more purpose. That way, I feel more accomplished as I am able to give meaning to my work, while at the same time keeping track of the progress.

Getting it done.

A lot of the times I feel like I’m procrastinating a lot because I have nothing to show for the work I do. The fact that I can’t see it, makes me feel like I’m not getting anything done or maybe it’s true, maybe I’m actually not doing any work. Say you have a full time job or you have projects to do for clients (Assuming you’re a freelancer) and that’s all you do. At the end of the day, it is so important that you find something to do for yourself. As a creative, I realize when I’m in the process of working for someone else, it doesn’t feel as fulfilling as when I create something for myself. Don’t get me wrong, I’ll give it my all, I’ll do my best but at the end of the day, I realize that the work is done according to their standards. The work doesn’t really belong to me, it belongs to them. If I’m lucky I’ll get credit but unfortunately, most of the time I don’t.

Remember, you want to create a strong portfolio for yourself showing everything that you do. When you work for other people, it’s harder to claim or show that you’re the one who did it when you don’t get credited. The assignments you create don’t have to be anything big. It could be a logo, template, background, card, wallpaper, photo, journal, book etc. Anything that can make you feel a lot more worthy in this life. In that case, after you assign yourself work and you’ve been able to complete it, have somewhere to display it. I keep saying we are so lucky because we get an unlimited amount of digital space, for free! When you put your work out there, it helps you take yourself more seriously. Plus it creates a chance for critiques to critique, which will help shape up your talent.

Keeping and beating deadlines.

I tend to find that because it’s ‘your own work’, you might be tempted to skip out on a day, or two or even forget about it completely. When you have an audience, they unknowingly help you keep track of your work. Your audience usually checks up on you and asks about the progress of your work. That usually helps me have that mindset of constantly creating and putting out work. The platforms that I can suggest for putting out your work are in the lines of a blog, vlog, basically posts on social media or any places that have a following, which will eventually help build your brand. I wish you all the best in fighting procrastination!

Also read: Taking pride in your work