What's behind the habit of constantly procrastinating?

Why do people have this marked tendency to leave things for tomorrow? To understand it we must try to understand what the phenomenon of procrastination is like, that tendency that we sometimes manifest in our day-to-day life that can be summarized as "leaving everything for tomorrow."

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Procrastination

Procrastination: what is it? The definition in itself is simple, it consists of postponing what we have to do: put the washing machine, study for the language test, the income tax return... But the mere act of delaying something is not procrastination, the concept of procrastination entails in its own definition an absurd delay, it is not postponing because it makes sense in a certain context, it isdo it irrationally, sabotaging our interests.

The person who is obsessed with completing any task at the first opportunity can be so dysfunctional as one who leaves everything to the last moment, neither one nor the other plan their time with intelligence. Overcoming procrastination implies

make smart use of your time, oriented to the achievement of the own objectives. It is in the choice of what you will do now and what you will leave for later that procrastination lies, not procrastination itself.

But if we know that procrastinating takes us away from our goals, why do we do it?

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Its causes

There appear to be both genetic and environmental factors that explain procrastination.

On the one hand, this is a common phenomenon in all cultures and moments in history. Is about a trend that affects men slightly more (54%) than women (46%), it is observed more among young people and decreases with age.

According to the data that science offers, most of it is explained by genetics; Nevertheless, the environment also contributes powerfully to our compulsive procrastination our chores. So much so that modern life has turned procrastination into an epidemic that has consequences at a personal and organizational level and is even noticeable in the economy of a country.

According to survey data, 95% of people admit that they procrastinate and one in four admit to doing it constantly. And it is that procrastination is a habit and as such it tends to last. One might think that it is because of the perfectionism, never finish things out of the obsession that they are perfect, but the truth is that the data indicate otherwise.

For a long time procrastination and perfectionism were believed to go hand in hand, this error is explained because the perfectionists who procrastinate are the ones who tend to ask for help in therapy (and from there the data), but there are many other people who are perfectionists and who do not go to therapy and who do not fall into the habit of procrastination. In particular, a much more fundamental role is that of impulsiveness: living impatiently in the now and wanting everything right now.

The role of impulsivity

Self-control and delay of reward they have a lot to do with impulsivity and this makes it very difficult for us to have a bad time for the sake of future reward. Very impulsive people tend to be disorganized, easily distracted, have difficulty controlling their impulses, find it difficult to be persistent, as well as work methodically. This difficulty in planning and this easy distractibility make them perfect victims of procrastination.

Impulsive people try to get away from an anxiety-provoking task, they are distracted, they remove it from their consciousness. Excuses and self-deception are common. This seems very logical, of course, because generally people try to avoid suffering. However, this only makes sense if we look at things in the short term, because in the long term this entails even greater suffering. Avoiding going through the unpleasant routine check-up of the doctor can lead us to detect prostate cancer when it is too late.

Sometimes the pressure of everything we have to do is so distressing that we indulge in distracting tasks so as not to think about what makes us think so much. It often happens that we are doing something that deep down we know we should not be doing because there is something more important and priority to attend to. That means that we are not doing what we should do that we do not enjoy that relaxing time, because our conscience constantly reminds us of our obligations.

However, impulsivity does not explain everything, procrastination is due to multiple causes.

The triad of procrastination

Expectations, courage, and time are the pillars that sustain this type of self-sabotage.

Expectation

Expectation refers to our confidence in achieving our goals and although procrastination is sometimes linked to overconfidence, the opposite is much more common. That is, if what we are pursuing It seems to us that we cannot take it, we just give up. Impotence, being incapable, leads us to stop trying.

This brings us to a state of decay and frustration known as learned helplessness, in which we surrender to circumstances because we believe we are incapable of changing anything and we stop fighting. This phenomenon is closely linked to depression.

In the end this becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy: believing that we will not be capable makes us give up. By stopping trying we effectively become capable and that confirms our beliefs about ourselves. It is a vicious circle.

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Value

Value has to do with how attractive what we are putting off is. Normally our procrastination list is full of boring tasks like doing the dishes, learning those endless articles of the Constitution or doing Christmas shopping. As you might suppose, the value of each thing depends on the desires of each one and some people tend to procrastinate some tasks more than others.

What it is easier to postpone something that we do not like, that does not motivate us, the less value a task has for oneself, the less likely it is that we will start doing it. Lack of pleasurable value makes other more enjoyable activities distract us and thus easily distract us. we distract and evade into more stimulating things, postponing as much as possible the tasks that seem to us soporific.

The time factor

Time leads us to procrastination because we choose immediate gratificationBecause we find a reward that materializes immediately, even a small one, more tempting than striving for a long-term goal, even if it provides us greater benefit.

Impulsiveness, which we have talked about before, is what is behind all this, and some other traits Linked to the impulsive temperament are poor meticulousness, low self-control, and a propensity for distraction.

Acting without thinking, not being able to get feelings under control… Leads us to procrastinate. The time factor makes us see tomorrow's goals and rewards in an abstract way, so much so that it takes away from reality. Instead, everything that has to do with today is more concrete and that makes it seem more real to us.

In conclusion

Procrastination is a deeply ingrained habit that can cause great amounts of suffering, leads us to distraction and takes us away from our goals. It is closely linked to impulsivity and time management, it is influenced by the value of reward we pursue and for the beliefs we hold regarding our own capabilities.

Author's Note: This article should have been published last month, but I've been procrastinating on it. In the next article I will talk about some useful clues to overcome this self-sabotage.

Bibliographic references:

• Steel, P. (2010). The Procrastination Equation: How to Stop Putting Things Off and Start Getting Stuff Done. Canada: Random House Canada.