Stop Procrastinating: Heal Trauma by Taking ACTION
Summary
TLDRThe video explores procrastination, particularly in individuals with childhood trauma, and how it can lead to paralysis in daily life. It discusses the cycle of avoidance and stress, emphasizing that procrastination is not self-care but a response to stress. The speaker shares personal experiences, highlighting the importance of taking consistent action, even small steps, to overcome this paralysis. Through deliberate effort, people can build momentum, find fulfillment, and stop feeling like life is passing them by. The message encourages overcoming procrastination by facing tasks head-on and creating a sustainable routine.
Takeaways
- 🧠 Procrastination often stems from stress, especially for those with childhood trauma, leading to a cycle of avoidance and increased stress.
- 😟 People with childhood PTSD can experience paralysis, where even simple tasks feel overwhelming and impossible to complete.
- ⚡ Overcoming procrastination requires taking action, even when it feels hard. It's about breaking through the paralysis and not waiting for the perfect moment.
- 🎯 Tackling stress is not about avoiding tasks but facing them directly. The key is to take one small step at a time to regain control and reduce stress.
- 💪 Building momentum through small, consistent actions is more effective and sustainable than big bursts of energy followed by burnout.
- 😔 Procrastination often disguises itself as self-care, but in reality, it increases stress and delays personal growth.
- 🌱 Taking action helps build strength and resilience. The more action taken, the easier it becomes, and it leads to a feeling of fulfillment.
- ⏳ People with childhood PTSD may avoid tasks out of fear of failure or stress, but avoiding tasks only makes things harder in the long run.
- 🏗️ Action, even small steps, helps create order out of chaos, leading to a more fulfilling life. Procrastination prevents people from reaching their full potential.
- 🚶♀️ Consistent, balanced action leads to long-term progress. Overcoming the fear of criticism and failure helps in taking continuous steps toward personal goals.
Q & A
What is the main issue discussed in the transcript?
-The transcript discusses procrastination, particularly how it can take over someone's life, especially for those who experienced childhood abuse or neglect. It explores the idea of 'paralysis,' where a person is unable to take action on their intentions due to stress and fear.
How does the speaker define procrastination?
-The speaker defines procrastination as a state of paralysis where a person finds themselves unable to take positive action on their own behalf, even for small day-to-day tasks or larger, more important responsibilities. It is seen as a way of avoiding stress but ultimately leads to more stress.
What role does stress play in procrastination according to the transcript?
-Stress is seen as a key driver of procrastination. It makes tasks seem harder, leading people to avoid them. However, this avoidance creates more stress, forming a vicious cycle where procrastination and stress feed into each other.
Why does the speaker think procrastination is common among people with childhood trauma?
-The speaker believes that people with childhood trauma, especially those with Complex PTSD (CPTSD), often experience chronic stress and emotional dysregulation. This makes everyday tasks feel overwhelming, leading them to procrastinate as a way to cope with the stress.
What is the speaker's proposed solution to overcoming procrastination?
-The speaker suggests that taking consistent, small actions is the key to overcoming procrastination. Instead of waiting for motivation, people should focus on building momentum by completing one small task at a time, which can help break the cycle of avoidance and stress.
How does the speaker describe their own experience with procrastination?
-The speaker shares their personal struggle with procrastination, particularly when creating videos, despite loving the final product. They describe how they often feel a strong urge to avoid work by engaging in trivial tasks, like cleaning or watching TV, because creative work is difficult.
What is the speaker's view on the idea of procrastination as self-care?
-The speaker rejects the idea that procrastination is a form of self-care. While resting is essential, procrastination only adds more stress and prevents people from accomplishing their goals, making them feel worse in the long run.
Why does the speaker believe taking action is crucial for people with CPTSD?
-The speaker emphasizes that taking action, even in small steps, helps build strength, confidence, and momentum. For people with CPTSD, action is a way to counter feelings of paralysis and to move toward healing by engaging in life rather than avoiding it.
What advice does the speaker give for people who tend to take large bursts of action and then crash?
-The speaker advises against trying to do everything all at once, as it can lead to exhaustion and a loss of momentum. Instead, they recommend taking action at a healthy pace, with small, consistent steps to build strength and maintain balance.
What is the overall message of the transcript?
-The overall message is that procrastination is often a response to stress and trauma, particularly for those with childhood CPTSD. However, by taking small, consistent actions, individuals can break the cycle of paralysis, reduce stress, and live a more fulfilling life.
Outlines
😖 Overcoming Procrastination and Emotional Paralysis
This paragraph discusses how procrastination can take over one’s life, especially for those who experienced childhood trauma like abuse or neglect. It highlights the emotional paralysis that procrastination causes, making individuals unable to act on their own behalf, even on simple day-to-day tasks. The speaker relates personal experiences of feeling demoralized by this paralysis and explains that procrastination sabotages one's intentions, affecting relationships, careers, and health. They introduce the concept of stress as a core problem and discuss how procrastination often emerges as a weak attempt to deal with it.
🔁 The Vicious Cycle of Stress and Procrastination
This section elaborates on the cycle of stress and avoidance, particularly for individuals with childhood PTSD. The stress from ordinary tasks leads to procrastination, which in turn increases stress. The speaker emphasizes how even simple things like interacting with others, maintaining a schedule, or making money become stressful. The paragraph encourages facing these tasks head-on to reduce stress and improve happiness. It also suggests changing one’s mindset—labeling tasks as life’s activities rather than sources of stress.
⚖️ Managing Stress with Balanced Action
Here, the speaker addresses the urge to tackle everything at once, which often leads to overwhelm and ultimately back to procrastination. They advise taking action at a sustainable pace and building habits like exercising a muscle. The importance of not identifying with trauma or self-defeating behaviors is stressed. While acknowledging workaholism, the speaker clarifies that their advice is aimed at procrastinators. The key message is that small, consistent steps are more effective than overexertion.
🏁 The Power of Commitment and Facing Fear
The speaker shares a personal story about procrastinating for years on their idea for 'Crappy Childhood Fairy.' Despite fears of judgment, failure, and the demands of commitment, they took action after attending a seminar. This marked the beginning of their journey to launch a blog, which later grew into a YouTube channel and courses. The key takeaway is that while fear of hard work is real, not pursuing one’s passion is far more stressful. Taking action, even with fear, is essential to fulfilling one’s potential.
🚶♀️ Small Actions Lead to Adventure and Fulfillment
This paragraph highlights the importance of taking small, consistent actions to build momentum in life. It acknowledges that success isn’t always guaranteed, but the adventure and personal growth that come from pursuing one’s goals are invaluable. The speaker urges people to continue taking action despite setbacks, noting that these small steps enhance one’s aliveness and open up new possibilities. For those with childhood PTSD, balancing action with self-regulation is crucial for maintaining long-term progress and avoiding burnout.
Mindmap
Keywords
💡Procrastination
💡Paralysis
💡Stress
💡Childhood PTSD
💡Self-care
💡Taking action
💡Avoidance
💡Commitment
💡Momentum
💡Dysregulation
Highlights
Procrastination is a common issue, but for those who experienced childhood abuse or neglect, it can take over their life and lead to depression.
This state of procrastination is referred to as 'paralysis,' where one is unable to take positive action, even on simple tasks like paying bills or brushing teeth.
The speaker describes their personal struggle with procrastination, even when working on projects they love, like creating videos, because the preparatory work is hard.
Procrastination is framed as a response to stress, creating a vicious cycle where stress leads to avoidance, which then causes more stress.
For individuals with childhood PTSD, even ordinary tasks can feel exhausting and stressful, making procrastination more likely.
The speaker emphasizes that procrastination is not self-care and actually adds to stress rather than alleviating it.
Facing stress head-on and taking action, even in small steps, can break the cycle of procrastination and help regain control.
Procrastination often results from the fear of the difficulty of tasks, rather than the tasks themselves being complex.
One strategy suggested is to take small, consistent actions daily to build momentum and reduce the feeling of overwhelm.
Identifying and addressing underlying issues, like feelings of anger or self-blame, can help in overcoming procrastination.
Making commitments to projects or goals can be daunting, but they can also provide structure and motivation to take action.
The speaker discusses their journey of overcoming procrastination by committing to a seminar and gradually building a successful project, emphasizing the importance of starting small.
Taking action regularly, even in small increments, helps develop confidence and resilience against the fear of failure or judgment.
Consistent small actions can lead to personal growth and fulfillment, even if they don’t always result in immediate success.
Procrastination can feel like life is passing by, but taking small steps towards action can open up opportunities and create a sense of purpose.
Transcripts
have you ever had the experience where
you know
you should do something like go to work
on time or put the laundry away or
finish a creative project or brush your
teeth before bed but you just couldn't
do it
everybody procrastinates sometimes but
for people who experienced abuse and
neglect in childhood
procrastinating can take over your life
it can hold you back it can make you
depressed that you're stuck day after
day in the same old rut like a paralysis
now what is that i've had this happen
i've spent months at a time in this
place before and i'll tell you it is so
demoralizing when it's happening to know
that you're here in the world to do good
but something in you is not letting you
do it
what causes it i'll tell you and i'll
show you how you can take steps today to
change okay so the problem with
procrastination is that it sabotages
your will your intentions right
and i call this state paralysis
because you literally find yourself
unable to take positive action on your
own behalf and this can be in little
day-to-day things like browsing the
internet when you have work to do or in
big things that affect lots of people in
important ways like not getting around
to mailing the utility bill and leaving
the whole family without electricity
now
that used to happen in the home where i
grew up you can also procrastinate to
the degree that you ruin your
relationship your career your integrity
and your health
and in fact we've all flaked out on our
good intentions in most of these areas
at least once right
so what's going on when we can't act
honestly i think that doing things
committing ourselves spending energy
creating something out of nothing the
reason we put it off is because it's not
really a big thing it's really simple
it's because it's hard that's why it's
hard
one of the great joys of my life is
in publishing videos like this one right
and then reading all the comments and
discussions that you guys contribute i
love doing this but if publishing videos
is my joy
and it's how my family also earns its
income
then how come
i spend days when i'm supposed to be
preparing these videos and planning and
researching and writing and getting the
intro right and shooting them
it's like torture for me i'm i'm dying
of avoidance during those days
and because making these videos takes
days of preparation really like it's
about six to eight hours per video
of just like focused creative work that
kind of work that's hard where you're
making something out of nothing well
when it's time to plan the content oh my
gosh
i just get so interested in you know
cleaning out the silverware drawer
combing the cat i've done both of those
things today
finally i'm making this video right
and it makes no sense because releasing
these videos makes me happy
but
doing the work that leads up to that
moment is just hard work that's all
there's nothing wrong with it there's
nothing that complicated it's just hard
i want so bad when i'm having to like
plan a video i just like i get this huge
desire i just want to lay down i want to
watch you know hulu
but
just like you if i give into that all
the time my life is never going to go
anywhere so lying around it sounds great
it's a nice fantasy that it's going to
make everything better but in reality
it's totally depressing
so what makes me happy is sticking to my
intention
to create videos even when it's hard i
make good videos i'm happy with them
well i make dead sometimes but being
engaged in creating and sharing and
serving people in the world is what
makes me tick now procrastinating is a
very weak solution that attempts to
solve the problem of stress it's stress
right stress is a problem and
it can make it seem like
any minute now we're going to get all
this energy in focus like i'll
procrastinate now and then boom you know
like a grenade i'm going to explode with
energy i always think i wish there was
like the
creative version of the defibrillator
you know those things they put on a
person's chest when their heart stops
and they jolt the heart back into
beating i always think like what's the
thing that's going to jolt me back into
work and like get me back to the desk
and there is no magic thing it's just
like no matter how i feel about it it's
getting up and walking over and then
sitting down in my chair here and doing
it so another piece of that fantasy is
the
is the delusion that procrastinating is
self-care
but is it
no
no resting it might be self-care but
procrastinating is not self-care it's
just like the worst waste of time
it doesn't de-stress you it causes
stress for people with childhood ptsd
especially when there's a lot of
unhealed stuff you're in a state of
stress pretty much all the time so
everything is hard and that is the
vicious cycle stress makes things hard
so you avoid tasks which makes you more
stressed which prompts you to avoid
tasks even more there it is
people who don't have childhood ptsd
have no idea how much work it is for
some of us to do ordinary things
it's exhausting and stressful just being
in the world sometimes right people are
stressful going out of the house is
stressful sticking to a schedule is
stressful
expressing yourself is stressful and
hearing other people's opinions when you
disagree with them that can be stressful
too
and making money of course is stressful
but you know what's more stressful not
doing all of these things and that's why
when you feel overwhelmed and stressed
the solution isn't always to just
retreat and give yourself permission to
procrastinate sometimes the best way to
calm stress is to just face right into
it and take the chaos of all those
unfinished tasks
and the heap of to do items and
forgotten emails and unfinished projects
and just get to work on them one at a
time
you might want to stop thinking about
stress and overwhelm to stop telling
yourself that the solution is to avoid
everything that's stressful for you just
even like just stop even labeling it
stress
just look at it as like this is life i'm
alive i'm doing the things that are part
of my life because in the end the path
of least resistance is to just do the
things just do them anyway that's how
they get easier you're making order out
of chaos and it feels good it feels
inspiring and that's how you get happier
so how do you get started
you get the urge sometimes once you feel
ready to just run out there and just do
it all right do you ever get that that
is such a childhood ptsd thing to go
from i can't do anything to just like
i'm gonna do everything
and there are times when it doesn't make
sense to just run out there and go for
it and force yourself to tackle your
list in a day i don't want to discourage
you if you've got that positive energy
but what can happen is you make a list
of 20 or 40 or 100 things you start on
the first thing and then you sort of
expand it to the first 10 things and
you're kind of doing them all at once
and running around and next thing you
know it's just regulating you because
you're tired and you're you know you're
trying to juggle too much and you can't
really like
keep order of your of your thoughts
you're just like go go go go go and then
you fall back into procrastination so
taking action at a good pace a healthy
pace it's like a muscle you can start to
work it out slowly just a little at a
time at first and then you get stronger
and whether you do a little at a time or
go on a cleaning binge today i'll tell
you what the solution is not the
solution is not
to give up on yourself don't identify
with the trauma and mistake paralysis
and giving up for being good to yourself
when you let yourself down your worst
behaviors will start just coming up now
i am aware that some people are like
workaholics so i don't want you to take
this advice and
usually it's not the workaholics who
would be writing me about this it's
people who are concerned about the
workaholics going but what about
workaholism it's not always good to keep
going and of course everything can be
done on the extreme but you know who i'm
talking to you know who you are it's the
procrastinators all right when you let
yourself down
your worst behaviors will start coming
up when you fall short of your own goals
you know what your cptsd wants to do it
wants to find someone to blame is it
going to blame you is it going to blame
him her your parents society right it
starts to churn
and you start having random thoughts
about how people are against you or
you're going over and over some harm
done to you in the past if that's
happening when you're trying to take
action
check in with yourself ask yourself is
there something that i'm having trouble
handling right now am i avoiding
something
am i actually angry at myself for not
following through on what i need to be
doing
and by the way if you're not sure if
complex ptsd is the thing that drives
some of your self-defeating actions like
this
you can take a quiz i developed and it's
it's right down in the description
section it's in the very top row you'll
see it right under the video you can
take that quiz and i will send you a
list of really common symptoms of cptsd
and you can check and see if they apply
to you
your strength
lies in action action taken in right
proportion to your capacity so don't
wait until it feels right for you to
start brushing your teeth all right just
take that one step and just brush your
teeth even if you're tired just for
practice just to stretch yourself
then the next day you can do the laundry
and if you're still feeling good you can
reply to emails that people wrote you
weeks ago
but that you never answered you can
schedule a haircut you can pop into the
gym that you pay for all the time but
you haven't been to in three months all
right you can review your credit card
bill for all the monthly subscriptions
you forgot you're paying and see if
there's any you can remove
you know the good actions that you need
to be taking next you may have to push
yourself
not like a maniac but some every day you
know that saying that you hear sometimes
don't be a human doing be a human being
well that's a good sentiment having
grown up in a commune i'm always a
little bit like skeptical of stuff like
that and the reason is because doing and
being are both really important all
right that that like criticism of like
doing having something wrong with it no
doing and being both important and doing
is how we earn a living and it's how we
express ourselves and how are you going
to become fully yourself if you don't do
things
it's not just the thing that you get
done it's the momentum that you build
from just doing anything at all and the
more you're taking action the easier it
becomes and the more natural it feels to
keep taking action
i procrastinated for years on the idea
for crappy childhood fairy it was on my
mind for two decades i mean it wasn't
totally formed yet i hadn't learned
everything i needed to learn really to
be ready but it was on my mind and i
didn't have the inner power to do
anything about it so eventually i did
i'm so glad and the thing that launched
me into action was i signed up for an
expensive seminar about how to share
your own life story as a way to teach
others like online
and i wanted to do this thing it just
seemed like this huge amount of money
and i was terrified to do it
and
what if i actually did the you know
launched it this started as a blog and
what if i did that and i got judged well
i did a little bit
what if my work was bad it is sometimes
what if i was successful and then i was
committed to always having to work hard
on it that is kind of what happened but
i don't have to work hard i like to work
hard i do procrastinate sometimes it
comes from the exact same place as
anybody's procrastination i just have a
lack of power to do what i intend
but that was the big fear is that i'd
get stuck i'd have to be in action all
the time and i'd have no escape
and
so i find that i have more confidence in
my ability to really step up and work
hard if i can periodically just like
take time away lie down not for too long
not that big like time waste or lie down
but just go hey i can take a break
anytime i want i don't have to fear this
i don't have to be afraid to make a
commitment i'll talk about this in
another video sometime but making
commitments is where life starts to get
really like rich so
so that's a lot what we're talking about
when we take action some of that is just
making a commitment to start a new
project and if you start the new project
i mean let's say you open a a shop right
well now you got to go to work every day
at the shop
and that's all it is it's hard you know
you can just foresee like even when i'm
sad even when i'm disregulated i'm gonna
have to go
but i really cannot emphasize enough
that while that is stressful it is so
much more stressful to not take that
action to not open that shop when that's
what you wanted to do imagine if i never
did the crappy childhood fairy just
because i was afraid it would involve
work
part of me would love to lay around and
just watch tv there's so much great tv
out there you know and it seems like
unlimited tv would really be nice but
most of us know what that really feels
like right it feels terrible
your life passes you by it feels like
it's passing you by because it is
passing you by you're not being you
you're not doing what you're meant to be
doing and what you're meant to be doing
is really the only thing that's ever
going to make you feel happy and
fulfilled and have that feeling like
i lived well today this was a good day
it was worthwhile i lived my life and
for me the things that make me feel that
way are
like connecting well with my family and
and people close to me
and a little bit every day of that also
to go be outside and walk around like i
go take a walk outside i feel like yeah
i lived my day
and
doing work that i know is making a
difference in people's lives that makes
a good day i like those days and i used
to feel envious of people who build
roads for example i don't know why roads
but you know you get stuck in traffic
and there's like road work there and
people are working i used to think god
they're so lucky they go home at night
and they're like you know today i built
100 feet of road
and it's a real thing and they did it
and they know that they had it and i
often had work that it was a little less
tangible
like you know working online working in
offices and i didn't have that
satisfaction but really the road is not
what would have done it for me it's
doing what i was made to do and finally
i'm doing it and it is so fun
it's so fun to to do the thing that you
were meant to do i knew it i knew it one
day i saw that seminar i paid the money
i went and it was a lot of money and it
was four days in a corporate hotel boy
that added up
and then on the third day i got stomach
flu i couldn't even go to the fourth day
it was kind of rough but i started
and that was the day
that the feeling that life was passing
me by like went away i started and i was
using my gifts i was on my way and i had
to make use of all that money i spent on
the seminar i felt like i had to follow
up and like make this blog the blog then
turned into the videos the videos turned
into the youtube channel then there were
courses now there's a membership and all
that it just grew and grew and it's just
kind of carrying me along in a thing
that i had a vague sense that i wanted
to do but i couldn't even see it
until i was kind of walking through the
paces of it and to this day like i don't
know exactly where it's going i just
keep taking action
i keep taking action try to show up for
it it can be hard
but never as hard as it would have been
if i knew that i could create crappy
childhood fairy but i didn't make the
effort
and that's why it feels like life is
passing you by when you can't act
because time is ticking and the world is
just waiting for you to step up and take
your true place in it it's time okay
it's time for you to do that you can do
that by taking action you can do it with
one you can do it with a big burst of
action but i think it's a little more
sustainable if you take small consistent
actions just take some every day get
them like worked into your routine
because they will get you there too
they give you a little breather though
between actions so that you can you know
kind of go through your cptsd
dysregulation get re-regulated come back
equilibrate do you know that word that
means like to get things balanced
um so that you can handle the stress
that life gives you each time you put
yourself out there that's what's scary
when you take action and you start
pursuing what you really want you're
putting yourself out there and so
when you get criticized and you will you
know you just will and that's okay when
you are very clear about what you're
trying to do it hurts less it doesn't
like stop you in your tracks like it
used to so you need that strength small
actions taken consistently
dealing with what happens equilibrating
and it's like super vitamins for
childhood ptsd
if you were constrained from letting
your light shine
your spirit is going to love doing this
these small actions you're getting
somewhere and accomplishment feels
really good that's what you were held
back from with your cptsd when you keep
taking those small actions
does success always follow no not always
but what does follow is adventure the
adventure of your life you're in the
game all right you're in the soup as my
mom used to say
you may or may not reach the goal you
may not even want the goal by the time
you get there but the act of taking
those steps will increase your aliveness
and open you up to life in all kinds of
ways that you didn't even expect all
right you're open for business your
strength is action
now it's totally common for people with
cptsd to take action in big bursts and
then crash afterwards and lose all the
momentum and i have a video that's about
preventing that it flows really nicely
with this video and you will find it
right here and i will see you very soon
[Laughter]
[Music]
you
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