“You cannot escape the responsibility of tomorrow by evading it today.” – Abraham Lincoln.
Procrastination is an affliction that debilitates even the best of us. But Future You is not going to be very happy with Present You if you keep delegating your tasks to him / her.
Procrastination is a symptom of lack of clarity. It is your brain saying “this thing is unclear, uncertain, unknown. I want to avoid pain but I want to feel that I am still productive and accomplished something. So let me clear out a few emails or do some of the low priority but easy tasks in my to-do list.”
Just awareness of these escapisms makes it easy for you to catch your mind making excuses. And then, just starting on the most important task for 2 minutes gives you the initial momentum to then keep going. The moment you get distracted again, become aware again, and restart the 2 minute effort. Take breaks as needed but give your mind time to breathe in those breaks.
But keep at it until you’ve made progress in your most important priority.
👉 As Kabir says, “Kal kare so aaj kar, aaj kare so ab”.