Procrastinating? Play trick-or-treat instead!

One of my absolute favorite books about conquering procrastination is The Complete Idiot's Guide to Overcoming Procrastination, by L. Michelle Tullier, Ph.D. In chapter twelve, on "Ten Surefire Strategies for Getting Anything Done," she offers an unbeatable list of ten procrastination-busting techniques. I walk you through them in a series of TikToks I made, and I want to highlight the tenth technique here, "Play Trick or Treat" as it's one of my favorites. In fact she offers five different kinds of tricks and treats.

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Distract yourself

You might feel that in order to get things done, you have to turn off the television or phone, shut down the video games, stay away from the shopping mall, keep your chatty friends and co-workers at bay, or avoid any other so-called timewaster or distraction that limits your productivity. The fact is, though, when you deprive yourself of something you enjoy or put yourself in an artificially sterile environment, you are often less productive.

I’m not saying you should try to write your Great American Novel while engrossed in an action-suspense thriller on television, but putting a small television in the kitchen might make you more likely to scrub those pots and pans or even to cook. The idea is to look for ways to combine doing what you enjoy with doing what you don’t necessarily like to do but need to do.

Dangle a carrot

There’s nothing like the promise of a reward for a job well done to get you motivated. Delayed gratification doesn’t work for everybody, but looking forward to a treat you’ve promised yourself is a handy technique to try. Plus, it helps ensure that you’re keeping some balance of work and fun in your life.

Beat the clock.

Pretend that you have a limited period of time in which to get something done and see how fast you can do it. Suppose you’re trying to clean out the garage. You estimate that you have about three hours of work left to do, but you don’t feel like working for three more minutes, much less three more hours. Pretend that you have only one hour left before someone will be coming over to see the finished product. Play a game of seeing how much you can finish in that hour. You might be surprised to find that you get three hours’ worth of work done in an hour because of the imaginary time limit. But even if you don’t, you’ve at least done more than if you had given up altogether.

Pretend you’re about to go on vacation.

You may know the feeling of going on vacation from a full-time job or a business you run. In the last few days, or even the last few hours, before that vacation, you probably get more work done than in a typical week on the job. The necessity of getting projects wrapped up or loose ends taken care of provides an adrenaline rush that propels your action into warp speed. (Plus, it helps to know that there’s a light at the end of the tunnel in the form of white, sandy beaches or wherever it is that you’re headed.)

You may not be able to go on an actual vacation, but you can play a trick on yourself based on that pre-vacation productivity boost. The game may encourage you to take stock of what you’ve fallen behind on and get it done or to move forward with something you’ve been putting off starting.  

Just do something.

I’m no physicist, but I believe physicists when they say that an object at rest will remain at rest until some force propels it into motion. It’s a handy principle to keep in mind when trying to get yourself to do something. Sometimes nothing works better than to take one little baby step toward a particular task. You’ll more than likely find that the first step propels you into motion and leads to more steps. If I reach into a dishwasher of clean dishes to take out the one bowl I need, I often find that I say to myself, “Well, I might as well go ahead and empty the whole machine.”

The act of procrastinating involves all sorts of mind games we play on ourselves. By playing trick or treat, we can turn those mind games to our advantage.

—L. Michelle Tullier, Ph.D., The Complete Idiot's Guide to Overcoming Procrastination, 2nd edition (Penguin Group, 2012, pgs. 158–9).

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Personally, my favorite is "pretend you're about to go on vacation." It's the most stressful, for me, but also the most powerful! There's nothing like the pressure of going out of town—even if it's imagined—to shove me into productivity.

What are you waiting for? Grab a copy of Dr. Tullier's book for yourself! Trust me, it's a game-changer.