Here's the real reason you procrastinate | Fuschia Sirois | TEDxNewcastle

Summary

This script delves into the pervasive issue of procrastination, revealing its commonality and potential harms beyond mere delays. It emphasizes that procrastination is a voluntary delay of important tasks, leading to negative repercussions for individuals and their relationships. The speaker debunks myths about laziness and time management, instead highlighting the role of emotions and avoidance in this behavior. Strategies such as finding meaning in tasks and practicing self-compassion are suggested to mitigate procrastination's detrimental effects on health and well-being.

Takeaways

• 😌 Procrastination is a common issue affecting nearly one in four people and is especially prevalent among students, with 50% regularly and 80-95% occasionally putting off tasks.
• 😟 Procrastination is not just a simple delay; it is a harmful form of delay that is voluntary, unnecessary, and involves avoiding important tasks with known negative consequences.
• 📚 The story of Tom illustrates the severe impact of procrastination, which can lead to irreparable damage to work, relationships, and health, and even premature death.
• 💼 Procrastination can cause reputational damage, making individuals seem unreliable and leading to employment instability and lower incomes.
• 💔 Chronic procrastinators often suffer from poor physical and mental health, including poor sleep quality, unhealthy behaviors, and higher levels of depression, stress, and anxiety.
• 🚫 Procrastination is not caused by laziness or poor time management; rather, it is a symptom and a coping mechanism for dealing with negative emotions and stress.
• 🤔 Procrastination often starts with tasks that are perceived as aversive or stressful, leading individuals to seek immediate relief through avoidance.
• 🏔 The tendency to make 'emotional mountains out of molehills' can increase the likelihood of procrastination, as people overestimate the difficulty of tasks and the negative emotions associated with them.
• 🔁 Procrastination can become a cycle, as the temporary relief it provides is often followed by guilt, shame, and self-blame, which can further fuel the avoidance of tasks.
• 🌟 Viewing tasks through the lens of meaning and asking why they are valuable can help increase positive feelings and reduce negative emotions associated with the task.
• ❤️ Being compassionate and forgiving towards oneself and others can effectively reduce procrastination by acknowledging human fallibility and the suffering that comes with it.

Q & A

What is the prevalence of procrastination among the general population and in educational settings?

Research suggests that almost one in four people procrastinate regularly, with rates even higher among college and university students, where 50 percent procrastinate regularly and 80 to 95 percent do so occasionally.

How is procrastination defined by researchers?

Procrastination is defined as a type of delay that is voluntary, unnecessary, and involves an important task that one intends to do but puts off despite knowing it will have harmful consequences.

What are some of the negative consequences of procrastination mentioned in the script?

Negative consequences of procrastination include damage to work projects, relationships, and health, as well as financial and academic repercussions.

Can you provide an example of the collateral damage caused by procrastination from the script?

Tom's story illustrates the collateral damage of procrastination, where his constant procrastination led to missed deadlines, job loss, and eventually, his early death from cancer, leaving his partner with a legacy of unfinished work and deep sadness.

What are the reputational and financial impacts of procrastination on employees as per the research mentioned in the script?

Procrastinators are seen as unreliable, leading to reputational damage. In a study of over 22,000 U.S. employees, chronic procrastinators had greater employment instability and lower annual incomes, with an annual income decrease of 15,000 U.S. dollars for every one point increase in procrastination.

How is procrastination related to physical and mental health according to the research?

Chronic procrastinators tend to have poor sleep quality, fewer healthy behaviors, more physical ailments despite fewer medical visits, and higher levels of depression, stress, and anxiety. They are also at a greater risk for poor heart health, with a 63 percent increased risk for cardiovascular disease or hypertension for every one point increase in chronic procrastination.

What common misconceptions about procrastination are debunked in the script?

The script debunks the misconceptions that procrastination is about laziness or poor time management. Instead, it highlights that procrastination is a symptom of poor mood management and an emotional response to avoid negative feelings associated with a task.

What is the psychological perspective on why people procrastinate, as discussed in the script?

From a psychological perspective, people procrastinate due to negative emotions and an urge to cope with them through avoidance. Procrastination is a way to manage mood and gain relief from stress and feelings of guilt or shame associated with the task.

How does the script explain the cycle of procrastination and the role of emotions in it?

The script explains that the cycle of procrastination begins with an aversive task, leading to negative emotions, which are then avoided through procrastination. This behavior is rewarded, leading to a cycle where the relief is short-lived and replaced by guilt and shame, further increasing the likelihood of continued procrastination.

What strategies are suggested in the script to help reduce procrastination?

The script suggests viewing tasks from the lens of meaning, asking why the task is valuable and important, and being compassionate and forgiving towards oneself and others as effective strategies to reduce procrastination.

How does the script address the myths about procrastination and the need for a change in perspective?

The script emphasizes the need to stop buying into myths about procrastination being a character flaw and instead accept it as a harmful behavior that requires understanding and compassion to overcome.

Outlines

00:00

🕵️‍♂️ Procrastination: The Silent Thief of Time and Health

The first paragraph introduces the ubiquity of procrastination, affecting one in four individuals and a significant majority of students. It emphasizes the harmful nature of procrastination, which is not just a simple delay but a voluntary act that leads to negative consequences. The paragraph uses the story of Tom to illustrate the severe repercussions of procrastination on personal life, work, and health, ultimately contributing to his untimely death. The research presented highlights the correlation between chronic procrastination and reduced income, employment instability, and poor physical and mental health, including increased risk of cardiovascular diseases.

05:02

🤔 Understanding the Roots of Procrastination: Emotion Regulation and Avoidance

The second paragraph delves into the psychological underpinnings of procrastination, debunking myths about laziness and poor time management. It posits that procrastination is a symptom of poor mood management, driven by negative emotions and the desire to avoid them. The speaker shares an anecdote about a writer who used cleaning as a coping mechanism during exam stress, illustrating how procrastination serves as an emotional escape rather than a reflection of one's character. The paragraph also discusses how people's tendency to exaggerate future emotional distress can lead to procrastination, and how the behavior can become a self-reinforcing cycle due to the temporary relief it provides.

10:06

🛠️ Breaking the Procrastination Cycle: Strategies for Change

The final paragraph offers strategies to combat procrastination by addressing the emotional aspects that fuel it. It suggests viewing tasks through a lens of meaning and significance to evoke positive feelings and reduce negative emotions associated with the task. The paragraph also promotes self-compassion and forgiveness as effective methods to disrupt the cycle of procrastination, guilt, and shame. The speaker argues against the stigmatization of procrastinators and instead calls for understanding and support, as research shows that these approaches can motivate individuals to improve and achieve their goals, ultimately reducing the overall impact of procrastination on well-being.

Keywords

💡Procrastination

Procrastination is defined as the act of delaying or postponing tasks or actions, especially those that one finds aversive or unpleasant. In the context of the video, it is portrayed as a voluntary, unnecessary delay involving important tasks, despite awareness of potential harmful consequences. The script highlights how common procrastination is, affecting individuals' work, relationships, and health, and even contributing to serious outcomes like Tom's story of unfinished goals and early death.

💡Harmful

The term 'harmful' in this video refers to the negative consequences or damages that result from actions or inactions, specifically procrastination. It is used to emphasize that procrastination is not just a benign delay but has serious repercussions on one's personal and professional life. The harmful effects include damage to reputation, financial instability, poor health, and emotional distress, as illustrated in the video with statistics and personal anecdotes.

💡Perfectionism

Perfectionism is a personality trait characterized by striving for flawlessness and setting excessively high standards for oneself. In the script, Tom's story mentions him being a perfectionist, which could be a contributing factor to his procrastination. Perfectionists often delay tasks due to fear of not meeting their own high expectations, leading to a cycle of avoidance and stress.

💡Deadlines

Deadlines are time limits by which a task or project must be completed. The video discusses the common issue of missing deadlines due to procrastination, which can lead to increased stress and negative outcomes in various aspects of life. Tom's narrative exemplifies the stress of chasing and missing deadlines, which eventually impacted his career and personal life.

💡Collateral Damage

Collateral damage in the video refers to the unintended negative consequences that result from an action, in this case, procrastination. It extends beyond the direct effects on the procrastinator to include the impact on others, such as Tom's partner who was left with a legacy of unfinished books and sadness due to his procrastination.

💡Reputational Damage

Reputational damage is harm to one's reputation or credibility. The video mentions that people who procrastinate are often seen as unreliable by their peers, which can affect their professional and personal relationships. This is supported by research findings that link chronic procrastination with employment instability.

💡Physical and Mental Health

Physical and mental health are integral aspects of overall well-being. The script discusses how chronic procrastinators tend to have poor sleep quality, engage in fewer healthy behaviors, and report higher levels of stress, anxiety, and depression. The video also links procrastination to an increased risk of cardiovascular disease, emphasizing the serious implications for both physical and mental health.

💡Emotional Forecasting

Emotional forecasting is the act of predicting how one will feel in a future situation. The video points out that people often overestimate the negative emotions they will experience in challenging situations, which can lead to procrastination as a means to avoid these anticipated feelings. This faulty emotional forecasting is identified as a precursor to the procrastination cycle.

💡Mood Management

Mood management refers to the strategies or behaviors used to regulate one's emotions. The video suggests that procrastination is fundamentally about poor mood management, as individuals use it as a coping mechanism to avoid negative emotions associated with certain tasks. This perspective shifts the understanding of procrastination from a time management issue to an emotional regulation challenge.

💡Compassion and Forgiveness

Compassion and forgiveness are presented in the video as strategies to reduce procrastination. These approaches help to alleviate the negative emotions associated with procrastination, such as guilt and shame. The video emphasizes that being compassionate and forgiving towards oneself and others does not condone procrastination but acknowledges the human tendency to make mistakes and promotes motivation to improve.

💡Meaning

In the context of the video, meaning refers to the significance or value attributed to tasks or actions. By viewing tasks through the lens of meaning and asking why they are valuable or important, individuals can enhance their positive feelings towards the task and reduce negative emotions. This approach is suggested as an evidence-based method for reducing procrastination by providing a more positive and contextual outlook on the task at hand.

Highlights

Procrastination is a common behavior affecting nearly one in four people regularly and up to 95% occasionally.

Procrastination is defined as a voluntary, unnecessary delay involving an important task with known harmful consequences.

The harmful effects of procrastination extend beyond immediate tasks to include damage to work projects, relationships, and personal well-being.

Tom's story illustrates the severe consequences of unaddressed procrastination, including missed deadlines and unfinished goals.

Research indicates that procrastinators suffer from reputational damage, employment instability, and lower incomes.

Procrastination is linked to poor physical and mental health, including poor sleep quality and higher levels of depression, stress, and anxiety.

Chronic procrastinators are at a greater risk for cardiovascular disease or hypertension.

Procrastination is not about laziness or poor time management but is rooted in emotions and avoidance behaviors.

Procrastination often starts with an aversive task and is used as a coping mechanism for negative emotions.

People tend to overestimate their future emotional distress, leading to the use of procrastination for relief.

The relief from procrastination is short-lived, often replaced by guilt, shame, and self-blame.

Being compassionate and forgiving can be effective strategies for reducing procrastination by reducing negative emotions.

Viewing tasks from a meaningful perspective can help increase positive feelings and reduce procrastination.

Myths about procrastination, such as laziness, should be debunked to avoid exacerbating the problem.

Acceptance of procrastination's harmful effects and a compassionate approach are key to breaking the cycle and improving outcomes.

The collective toll of procrastination on physical, social, and mental well-being can be reduced through understanding and addressing its emotional roots.

Transcripts

Transcriber: Vivian Lim Reviewer: esra kurul

Do you know someone who procrastinates?

Yeah, maybe it’s a friend, a coworker, family member,

maybe it’s somebody you see when you look in the mirror.

But that’s okay, because everyone procrastinates at some point right?

In fact, the research suggests

that almost one in four people procrastinate on a fairly regular basis.

And the rates are even higher amongst college and university students,

with 50 percent, yes, that’s five zero, 50 percent procrastinating regularly,

and 80 to 95 percent doing so occasionally.

Now, because procrastination is so common,

we tend to be very light-hearted about it.

Oh, listen to that podcast or read that book on procrastination later.

What’s the harm, right? It’s just delay.

Well, actually,

procrastination is not your garden-variety, run-of-the-mill delay.

It's a particular form of delay that by definition is harmful.

Now, researchers like myself define procrastination as a type of delay

that is voluntary, unnecessary,

and involves an important task that you intended to do.

But you put this task off despite knowing

that it’s going to have harmful consequences

for yourself and others.

People are often surprised to learn just how debilitating

and harmful procrastination can be.

Now, if you procrastinate managing your finances or completing your academic

or professional work, dealing with relationship issues,

or managing your health and well-being.

Yes, you can expect to have some negative consequences in those areas.

But what we often don't consider is the collateral damage of procrastination.

Take, for example, Tom's story.

Now, Tom was well-read, highly educated, and a bit of a perfectionist.

Despite this, Tom struggled with procrastination in his work

and in his life.

He would put off some small task,

but then this would snowball into him scrambling to trying to meet,

but often miss important deadlines.

Eventually, this pattern of procrastination

would cause irreparable damage to his work projects, his co-workers,

and his prospects for advancement.

The stress from constantly chasing and missing deadlines,

quitting three different jobs,

trying to be, but failing to be a published author,

eventually caught up with Tom and his partner.

Unfortunately, at age 47, Tom died from cancer.

To his partner, Tom left a legacy of unfinished books and a deep sadness

for knowing that his procrastination was never effectively addressed.

Procrastination stole from her quality time she could have had with him, had he

had he not been constantly focused on chasing missed deadlines

or worrying about unfinished tasks.

Now, sadly, Tom’s story is actually consistent with much of the research

on the toll of procrastination.

In our research, we found that procrastination has reputational damage.

People don’t like working with others who procrastinate.

They see them as unreliable. But that's not all.

In one study of over 22,000 U.S. employees,

those who chronically procrastinated had greater employment instability

and lower annual incomes.

In fact, for every mean, one point decrease,

oh, sorry, increase in procrastination,

annual income went down by 15,000 U.S. dollars.

That’s about 12,000 pounds a year.

Okay, so research by myself and others over the past 20 plus years has also found

that procrastination is associated with poor physical and mental health.

People who chronically procrastinate, they tend to have poor sleep quality.

They practice fewer healthy behaviors.

And they also report having

a greater number of physical ailments despite making fewer medical visits.

They have higher levels of depression, stress, and anxiety.

Now one study of over 750 people,

I found that people who chronically procrastinated were at greater risk

for having poor heart health.

For every one point increase on a measure of chronic procrastination,

the risk for having cardiovascular disease or hypertension increased by 63 percent.

And this was after accounting for a number of different social,

and demographic factors, and personality factors

that are known to predict poor heart health.

So if it’s so harmful, then why do people do it?

Now, many people think that it’s about laziness or poor time management.

But just because something looks like procrastination

doesn’t mean that it’s a cause.

When it comes to procrastination, appearances are very deceiving.

Okay, so when we’re procrastinating,

it looks like we’re wasting time and not managing that time well,

because we're not meeting deadlines.

But poor time management is actually a symptom of procrastination, not a cause.

And so, if we only treat symptoms, the underlying cause is going to remain.

Procrastination isn’t about laziness either. Right?

When we feel lazy, we don’t feel like doing anything at all. No energy.

But when people procrastinate,

they often get very busy with a number of non-essential tasks,

such as completely cleaning and reorganizing the kitchen,

or the office,

curating their digital music library,

or even alphabetizing their spice rack.

They will do anything, but that task that needs to be done.

Okay, so if it's not laziness and it's not poor time management,

then why do people procrastinate?

From a psychological perspective,

all behaviors have an origin story.

For procrastination, that origin story focuses on emotions,

and specifically negative emotions,

and an urge to cope with them through avoidance.

So one writer I spoke to,

he confessed to me that he really didn’t like cleaning at all.

But when he was a student,

if he had an exam coming up that he was stressed about,

cleaning his flat from top to bottom became his go-to activity

instead of studying.

Why?

Because it made them feel productive, not lazy.

It gave him relief from his exam stress,

and from his feelings of guilt and shame about not studying.

His procrastination was not a character flaw.

It was the only way he knew how to manage his exam stress.

So what this illustrates then

is that procrastination is about poor mood management,

not for time management.

Now this makes sense if we look at below the surface of what appears

to be procrastination for somebody not getting things done or wasting time,

and view procrastination from the lens of psychological science.

When we do so, it becomes very clear

why emotions are central and understanding

whether somebody both starts to procrastinate,

and whether they’re going to continue to procrastinate as well.

Okay, so how do we get started with procrastination?

Well, procrastination starts when we have a task

that is aversive, unpleasant, right?

But we have to do it.

And we use procrastination then

as a way to get relief from those negative emotions associated with the task.

So procrastination is not necessarily about avoiding a task.

It’s actually about avoiding the negative emotions

that we associate with a task.

Okay, so you’ve got this thing to do,

and it’s really stressful, and you’re really concerned about it,

but you just don’t feel like you can manage those feelings right now.

So what do you do?

You take that task,

you put it aside and you get immediate relief.

Mission accomplished.

You just cope with those negative emotions by procrastinating.

It's quick, it's easy, and it works, at least for a little while.

Okay, so can you think of a time when you had a task to do

that you felt really uncertain about?

Maybe it was something that you hadn't done before

or something that you had very little guidance on.

And you may have started out sort of imagining, okay,

what's this task going to be like?

And you started thinking of it being a really stressful,

and time consuming and frustrating.

And the more you thought about what you thought the task might actually be,

the more worked up and worried you got about it.

So much so that you wanted to do anything but that task.

So you procrastinated.

But then later you actually did get around to doing the task.

You discovered that in reality it actually wasn’t that time consuming

or frustrating or difficult at all.

In fact, you may have even enjoyed it.

You see when we make emotional mountains out of molehills,

we’re more prone to use procrastination as a way to get relief from that.

Now people will make emotional mountains out of molehills,

mainly because we’re just not very good at predicting our future emotional states.

Numerous studies have shown that people tend to overestimate how bad they’ll feel

when they’re in a challenging situation.

And for some people, that faulty emotional forecasting

can be a precursor to procrastination.

Okay, so once somebody started to procrastinate,

they're also at more risk for continuing to procrastinate.

When you use procrastination to manage your mood,

you're actually rewarding that procrastination behavior.

And because we tend to repeat behaviors that we are rewarded for,

this can easily feed into a cycle of procrastination.

The problem is that the relief you get from procrastinating doesn’t often last.

Soon replaced by feelings of guilt,

shame and self-blame for knowing that you let yourself and others down.

These types of negative thoughts and feelings though,

don’t actually motivate you taking action.

Research has found is all they do is layer on

an extra layer of negative emotions to a task that you're already dreading doing,

which will only increase the chances that you're going to continue to procrastinate.

Okay, so how can we help ourselves and others

navigate the emotional landscape of procrastination without getting lost

in a cycle of guilt and shame and further procrastination?

If you’re the one procrastinating, it might be easy to think:

“Oh, I’ll just downplay that.

My procrastination make a joke about it, right?”

But that won’t make the damage to your reputation, self-esteem,

relationships, or health and well-being go away.

Procrastination is harmful.

If it’s somebody else is procrastinating,

you may be tempted to come down hard on them and think that

letting them know just how harmful that procrastination is to you, to others,

and themselves might be a way to get them to stop.

But all that’s going to do is make them feel worse about themselves,

and the task they’re procrastinating and therefore procrastinate more.

Instead, we need to find ways to defuse the negative emotions

and break the cycle of procrastination.

So one evidence-based approach

for reducing procrastination is to view our tasks from the lens of meaning.

When we view our tasks as meaningful and asking ourselves:

“Why is this valuable to me? How is it important?

What will I learn about myself from doing this task?”

It helps dial up our positive feelings about the task,

as well as reduce some of the negative emotions we have

and give them more context.

Counterintuitively, being compassionate and forgiving to ourselves

and others when we procrastinate are also effective strategies

for reducing procrastination.

Both of these approaches reduce the negative emotions we have

both about ourselves and our procrastination.

Now you might be thinking this is like giving people a free pass

for when their procrastination, but it’s actually not at all.

When we're forgiving and compassionate,

we acknowledge and accept that people are suffering when they’re procrastinating,

and that we're human and we all make mistakes.

When we’re self compassionate, remind ourselves that

we’re not the first person to procrastinate,

nor will we be the last.

But more importantly,

the research shows that being forgiving and compassionate

in response to procrastination

is actually effective for reducing procrastination,

and boosting people's motivation to improve themselves and reach their goals.

So if we want to find sustainable solutions

to reduce our own and others procrastination,

we need to stop buying into the myths of laziness

and other character flaws that only serve to make us feel worse

and procrastinate more.

We need to accept that procrastination is harmful on many levels,

but then be forgiving and compassionate.

Only then can we help others and ourselves get that task done.

Reach our goals and reduce the collective toll of procrastination

on our physical, social, and mental well-being.

Thank you.

(Applause)

(Applause)