The Secret Value of Procrastination

As a blogger, writer, internet marketer and online business, I need to create quality writing on a regular basis. What you may not know is that I am frequently visited by writer’s block the size of the iceberg that sank the Titanic. The foot soldier of writer’s block is Procrastination, the fine art of putting the dreaded activity off.

Procrastination can sink your work, internet marketing and online business success.

Yet, there’s an important secret value to procrastination you must know.

First, let’s look at procrastination. Procrastination can assume various guises to accomplish its sabotage of your work and online business success.

There is the Ever More Research tactic- one that gets me most times. If I’m feeling stuck, I figure I might be able to push off that iceberg with more information. More information naturally seduces with calls for more details and related sidetracks and blind alleys. Before I know it 2 or 3 hours have passed with nary a word on the page. Even more seductive is that I now have more ideas for more writing which may or may not ever see ink. To be fair, occasionally the research tactic does lead to a writer’s block breakthrough.

Next, there’s the Things I Have to Do First before I write tactic. This can include anything from a complete re-organization of the office to email reading and replying (a favorite time sink of so many people), a post office run, “just a short phone call”, or reading the fine print on a cereal box. Somehow the morning or day has slipped by and the bow of the Titanic has slipped closer to the sea.

The Battle of the Mind usually comes next. All the self defeating mental chatter of your psychologist’s warnings surfaces and shoots torpedoes towards your day’s plans and best work attempts. No, you can no longer do this, the chatter says (even though you’ve been doing it for years). It’s no good, it won’t work, it won’t sell, on and on.

Where did this mind mutiny come from? Wherever, it is one of the most dangerous guises of procrastination. It can sometimes be countered by frequent reminders that this negative self talk is only an evil spell and not real.

After such a day- researching, racing through To Do lists that include everything except the writing, battling my own brain- I’m wiped out. So, as I sit at the computer pleading and teasing the writer’s muse to surface, Neptune sends the Sands of Sleep to complete the job. I ride wave upon wave of sleepiness. Never mind that a spin in the garden or a walk along the local beach would rouse me. No, I begin to sink beneath the sea of work. Maybe a marine archaeology team will find me in a hundred years.

How, you ask, can there be any value to procrastination? Isn’t it simply a mental sabotage set to sink your goals and derail your online business success?

There is great value to procrastination. This secret is vital to your work and online business success.

Procrastination is a valuable warning sign, somewhat like radar or a tsunami warning system.

Procrastination tells us something is wrong here and now.

If you want to increase your work and online business success, your job is to find out what that something wrong is.

So, rather than fight procrastination as an evil villain, welcome it. Ask it to sit down and have a cup of tea. Let it (and you) relax a few moments. Then, ask it what the problem is.

What is the procrastination trying to protect you from?

Because that’s what procrastination is. It is a protection device. It is trying to help you. It may take a while, but gently asking a few times will usually begin to get some answers.

Move beyond “I don’t like it” and “I don’t want to” to “Why?” What about it? What if I did it or didn’t do it? What does doing it or having done it or not done it make me feel like? And so on. Let the questions come.

Answering these and other questions can lead you to discover what you need to do the task more comfortably (e.g., help, chunk it down, go slowly, make it safer, bargain with yourself with rewards for tasks accomplished etc.). You may find you need to do something else first to get more comfortable doing the task.

You may find in some soul searching that this is not the path you want to pursue after all. Something else may be more satisfying.

So, listen to yourself and your procrastination. Incorporate what you find. Then, move forward with smoother sailing for your internet marketing, online business success and other work activities.