Done for the Week: Taking the Energy Up a Notch

Maybe it's a perverse reaction to Punxsutawney Phil's prediction of six more weeks of bleakness.  Maybe it's because my countdown clock registers 10% of 2012 gone.  Or maybe the worm has turned.  (See Words@Random's exposition of this vermicultural phrase's "roots.")

For whatever reason, I have been a bit more focused and energetic this past week.  Here's hoping the worm in question remains in this position.  And here's the evidence of its workings.

Done for the Week:  Jan. 30-Feb. 5, 2012

1. Biked three times; swam once
   
2. Used my newly purchased heart rate monitor for the first time
3. Had oh-so-pleasant deafening MRI of foot injury; awaiting results from vacationing orthopedist 
4. Watched four basketball games with various family members
5. Continued reading Elizabeth George's A Place of Hiding aloud with my husband
6. Read Corduroy Mansions by Alexander McCall Smith
7. Continued to work my two part-time jobs, putting in extra hours
8. Signed on for BlogHer's NaBloPoMo
9. Published 6 blog posts
10. Continued work on current clients' projects
11. Attended two yoga classes
12. Did laundry 
13. Continued supporting my son in his college application process 
14. Set up college visit, subsequently cancelled by cold feet
15. Supported my other son in beginning his new--and first-ever real--job 
16. Took son out to dinner to celebrate job
17. Had lunch and coffee dates with my husband
18. Went out to dinner with my husband 
19. Watched an episode of Eureka with my son
20. Meditated 3 times, once in an MRI machine
21. Finished re-hanging bathroom window shutters
22. Completed repair on remaining bedroom closet door 
23. Talked my credit union into one day's grace which allowed commingling of  two IRA accounts
24. Took my grandson swimming
25. Took my dog to the dog park twice, with one son and one husband
26. Completed meal planning for coming week
27. Did massive and expensive grocery shopping solo while men watched the Super Bowl
28. Babysat grandchildren for daughter's doctor's appointment

Last week's most important accomplishment was the re-energizing of this blog. A result of my new overall verve?  Or a contributor to that improvement?  Both, I think.

Personal fitness trainer Sharon Sorrels tells us, referring to the process of physical reconditioning, that  "you have to spend energy to get energy - especially when it feels like you have no energy." If I remember the basic rules of logic, from the bygone days in which I learned them, this does not mean that spending energy always enhances our store of vitality.  Using energy may be a "necessary but not sufficient" condition of acquiring more.



But it has been my experience that there are times (when the stars are properly aligned?  "when the moon is in the seventh house?"  when the gods are smiling?) when one good thing leads to another.  When the result of putting out energy cheers me, or the act of moving off the dime inspires hope and a sense of efficacy.  And this past week seems to have been one of those times.


At the best of such times, putting to bed one thing after another becomes a spiral of effort and accomplishment.  And in this case, I am energized by my blog's return from its recent period of semi-dormancy, to tackle other things.  And the addressing of those other things leads me back to the blog with renewed purpose.


I should also give credit to the decision to participate in BlogHer's NaBloPoMo (National Blog Posting Month) project for the month of February.  This represents the kind of "precommitment" that Piers Steel (author of The Procrastination Equation) advises as a useful crutch for procrastinators.  For me, the public nature of this precommitment adds the frisson of exposure that puts me over the top, making me that much more motivated to deliver.

My focus goal for last week was to meditate as many days as I could manage.  Apparently, I could only manage 3, but it's a start.  I remain challenged by a schedule that seems to change by the hour.  It might be a good idea to try pegging meditating to one or both of the two things I can count on happening every day--getting up, and going to bed.  For the coming week, I will focus on figuring that out, and on meditating as many days as I can manage.

 

So Many Blogs, So Little Time. . .

If you are reading this post, according to my "analytics," you are most likely:

• one of my (thankfully many) family members
• one of my (thankfully many) friends
• looking for a cool image
• seeking a downloadable copy of Neil Fiore's Unschedule
• accidentally here because of the vagaries of Google search
• interested in "bed" 
• someone whose book I am writing about
• interested in procrastination
• a procrastinator
• like me, a perpetually recovering procrastinator

You may fall into more than one--or even all--of these categories.

However that shakes out for you, I'm guessing that you could benefit from, and would probably enjoy the work of other bloggers writing about procrastination.  I recommend you take a look at the blogs below.  Some have cool images, some mention the Unschedule, all have useful information and advice to impart.  By way of a caveat, I should tell you that none have the word "bed" in their title.


Check them out!


Don't Delay--Dr. Timothy Pychyl's Psychology Today blog subtitled "Understanding procrastination and how to achieve our goals."  Dr. Pychyl's work has informed many of my blog posts.  His new book, The Procrastinator's Digest: A Concise Guide to Solving the Procrastination Puzzle will be the subject of my next Procrastinating 101 series.  Dr. Pychyl is a multi-faceted communicator, whose methods include podcasting and cartooning, and whose website is an eclectic trove of procrastination resources.

The Procrastination Equation--"Everything you wanted to know about procrastination but put off finding out," by Dr. Piers Steel, who just happens to be the author of a book by the same name, which was the subject of 12 of my Procrastinating 101 posts earlier this year--and my favorite, thus far, of all the zillions of books I've read about procrastinating.  While procrastinating.

Procrastinating Writers--"Guidance for Writers Who Struggle to Get Started," by Jennifer Blanchard, creativity and writing coach and, oh yeah, procrastinating writer.  Ms Blanchard is also a prolific tweeter.  Just try and keep up with her frequents tweets!

Science and Sensibility --by Dr. Bill Knaus, co-author of the classic Overcoming Procrastination and author of the new End Procrastination Now.  The blog is labeled "A psychological potpourri," and deals frequently with procrastination, ADD, and similar issues.

Structured Procrastination:  One Man's Effort to Avoid His Actual Duties--by Dr. John Perry, of structured procrastination fame, and recent recipient of a 1g Nobel prize for his work on the concept.


These are blogs I like, and learn from.  You can certainly find others--and if you do happen upon a good one, please tell me about it.


By the way, if you google "procrastination blogs," a lot of what you find will be bloggers--of every ilk, on every topic--posting about their own blogging procrastination.

Procrastinating 101: Getting Ourselves in Line

Diana DeLonzor's seventh chapter in Never Be Late Again:  7 Cures for the Punctually Challenged--"Cure Four:  Develop Your Discipline Muscle"--is our Procrastinating 101 focus for this week.  I can't say I'm all that thrilled at the prospect of yet another admonishment on self-discipline, especially two days before Thanksgiving.  But I'm committed to slogging through, and learning what I can.

Is the notion of lagging self-discipline more palatable because the chapter begins with a quote about a nun with this trait?  Are we in good company if it can be said of Maria, in The Sound of Music, that "She's always late for everything, except for every meal"? 

In her introductory paragraphs, DeLonzor reminds us of studies indicating that we late-niks as a group have more issues with self-control than do those who generally arrive, and complete things, on time.  Dr. Piers Steel has written most comprehensively about impulsivity as a contributor to procrastination in The Procrastination Equation.  

DeLonzor also points out that self-discipline is not necessarily an across-the-board issue.  We might do quite well at quitting smoking, or exercising, or cleaning the kitchen nightly, but play waayyyy too much solitaire on the computer, or play chicken with the snooze button, or read just one more chapter when we know we don't have time. . . .  (Hmm.  Sounds familiar. . .)  Reading this made me think of something I learned from reading Switch:  How to Change Things When Change is Hard, by Chip Heath and Dan Heath, and blogged about earlier this year:  self-control is exhaustible.  That is to say, those of us who are fighting our natures or battling stress on many fronts may simply run out of the capacity to behave optimally. 

What is this capacity whose supply can be outstripped by the demands of our everyday lives?  In DeLonzor's nutshell, self-discipline is 

all about. . . the ability to make sacrifices and accept limitations.  It's the strength to choose what's best in the long run instead of what feels good right now, even if it means having to give something up.

And for each of us, our difficulty (or facility) with self-discipline is largely determined by

• Our experience with effort and discomfort
• Genetics
• Family influences

So, are you one of those challenged by impulsiveness?  Three or more yeses in response to the following questions qualify you as an "Indulger," plagued by a "weak discipline muscle."

• Do I have several bad habits that I've tried repeatedly, but unsuccessfully, to conquer?
• Do I tend to play things by ear, rather than sticking to a schedule?
• Do I frequently say or do things I regret?
• Do I have difficulty starting projects?
• Am I usually impatient when I have to wait?
• Do I lack long-range goals and daily plans?

My answers?  Well, maybe a few.  Yup.  Not really.  Nope; finishing projects is my bugaboo.  Depends on what I'm waiting for--dentist appointment and flight boarding?  yes; Christmas and check-out lines (unless I'm late for something), not so much.  And yes. 

I guess that makes me sort of a borderline Indulger.  Yeeks!  I'm already an official Rationalizer, a Producer and a Deadliner.  Is is possible that I commit all 7 deadly sins of lateness?  Or are these quizzes like a lot of zodiac signs and fortune cookies, general enough to apply universally given a liberal enough reading?  But I digress--another character flaw.  Back to self-discipline, and the cure.

Interestingly, DeLonzor relies on different research findings than those invoked by the Heath brothers to maintain that habits of self-discipline carry over from one realm to another--that we can build brain structure that assists us in resisting impulses in new situations. 

For the Indulgers, and yes, the borderline Indulgers among us, DeLonzor recommends this three-pronged approach to developing our self-discipline "muscles:"  

• Learn to increase your tolerance for discomfort
• Practice making transitions
• Become a planner and goal setter

For each strategy, she again provides a group of exercises--ten pages in all--designed to boost self-control.  Clearly, I don't have the requisite self-control, or the time, to engage in all of them.  I definitely plan to skip the first, which basically involves self-deprivation--and thus flies in the face of the self-care I've been advised to grow in my life.  I'm actually already pretty good at sacrifice and discomfort, having been a mother for 34 years now, and a Catholic for some 20 years before that.

I would probably benefit, however, from these two:

Practice stopping midstream.  Whether you're in the middle of an engrossing novel or watching a good TV program, practice stopping before you're ready, if even for five minutes.  Doing so will give you practice in making transitions so that when it really matters, you'll be up to the task;

and

Practice making and adhering to a set schedule that includes time-estimates and priorities.

And the key with this last exercise is to base the list of tasks and priorities on long- and short-term goals, instead of randomly adding items to a to-do list, with an unmoored goal of getting "as much done as possible."

 

It seems, after all this time, and all the procrastination gurus I've consulted, it so often comes down to this.  Maybe there's a reason my post on Neil Fiore's "unschedule" is by far my most popular.  So far, I have not had/developed the necessary self-discipline to use it myself!  Perhaps it's time. . .

Procrastinating 101: (Probably Not) The Last Word on "The Procrastination Equation"

So, I am finally getting around to winding up my Procrastinating 101 summer odyssey through The Procrastination Equation, Dr. Piers Steel's compendium of the science of delay.  And I begin this post by confessing that the enterprise's inception was plagued by tarrying.

After determining that Dr. Steel's book would follow Joseph Ferrari's Still Procrastinating? as Procrastinating 101's featured work, I apparently suffered a momentary lapse, in which I forgot to obtain said volume.  This was followed by a further mental mishap, in which I imagined that I had gotten the book.  I could see it in my mind.  (I'd seen its image online.)  And I envisioned it occupying the place on my shelf where I would have stashed it had I secured it.  

The night before I planned to write the first post, I went to the shelf and, like Old Mother Hubbard, discovered the absence of the phantom edition.  A late night expedition to my neighborhood chain bookstore remedied the situation, but perhaps I should have recused myself from reviewing a serious work on a subject I apparently knew waayyyyyy too much about.

But I didn't.  Instead, I spent the next sixteen weeks knee-deep in The Procrastination Equation's compelling exposition of all we can learn from a breathtaking array of research on putting stuff off.

And after all that, am I cured of what Dr. Steel so scientifically refers to as "dilly-dallying?"  Not really.  Though I do have a much keener appreciation of the degree to which I, like all other humans, have been set up to sputter through the motivational demands of life in the 21st century in this culture.  And I have acquired a repertoire of strategies to use in countering my tendencies, hardwired and acquired.

Dr. Steel's Postscript, following Chapter 10 and quaintly entitled "Procrastination's Chapter 11," appends a brief discussion of the potential of disciplinary integration to focus our efforts to defeat procrastination, the "ubiquitous" common enemy.  He reminds us that "the top two ways that people procrastinate are through their televisions and through their computers," and suggests that we "apply the principles of self-control [put forth in The Procrastination Equation] to our own technology."  Thus DVRs, "attentional control programs like Rescue Time," and "a sophisticated and difficult-to-subvert nannyware program--like Chronager, except self-administered," could form the basis of an "effective self-control platform."

With further advances in integration, more such tools that address our own weak wills should become commonplace, designed into our society's fabric.  And ironically, for all this, we can partly thank procrastination.  Fittingly for an irrational self-defeating delay, by making possible the groundwork for integration, procrastination may have contributed to its own defeat.

And that's all he wrote. 

# # #

Finishing with this book feels a bit like ending a semester.  I am tempted to try to assign myself a grade.  To what extent have I mastered the material?  I haven't taken the final, so it's hard to say.

Which makes me think of the last institution of higher learning in which I taught.  That innovative establishment had developed an approach to measuring learning in which "test" was a dirty word.  Instead, we administered "assessments," designed to approximate real-world situations in which a performance would reveal the incorporation of new information, understanding, and ability.  

In this context, a relevant assessment opportunity is available with each new dawn.  And this course in what to do about procrastination isn't over until it's (all) over, mellifluous fat lady or no such personage. 

Procrastinating 101: Some Assembly Required

Procrastinating 101 is nearing the end of what Dr. Piers Steel has referred to as our "leisurely walk" through his book The Procrastination Equation:  How to Stop Putting Things Off and Start Getting Stuff Done.  This week, in Chapter 10, "Making it Work:  Putting the Pieces into Practice," we look at how we might begin to live all that we have been learning.  

But first, we have to remember all that research we've waded through, all those insights and tips we've garnered along the way.  And then we have to gird ourselves for the project of using all that good stuff in making over our disarray.  And then we have to leap that leap of faith--the one that requires we imagine ourselves as able to procrastinate less.


And I say less because Dr. Steel, among others, has taught me that procrastinating is a tendency that I was born to, and one that I've nurtured long and well.  The temptation to delay we have always with us.


Fortunately, my tiny, dried-up seed of faith has broken open in the soil of Dr. Steel's informative treatise, and been watered this week by Chapter 10's stories of procrastination recovery.  (And, I'm feeling more optimistic all around, after finding yesterday the last missing piece to a jigsaw puzzle my kids and I completed, sans final dark green leafy element, weeks ago.)

In Chapter 10, Dr. Steel reprises the three prototype characters introduced in Chapter 2--Eddie, Valerie and Tom.  Eddie, you may recall, is stymied by low "Expectancy;" Valerie, by low "Value;" and Tom, by issues of sensitivity to "Time."  (Oh, and--plot twist--turns out Eddie and Valerie are married to each other.  Yike, two serious procrastinators in one household!)  But in this next-to-last chapter, our procrastinating friends finally "get it."  Each in their own way, they apply the lessons of the book and emerge from the morass created by their previous difficulties.  Ah, a happy ending.  Actually, three of them.  And more, if we can ultimately count ourselves.

Those of us who are "lucky" enough to fall neatly within one of the three procrastination types represented by our three heroes of recovery should be able to apply the corresponding solutions in a fairly straightforward manner.  For others, like myself, who are more "democratic" delayers--displaying significant handicaps in all three areas--a bit more brain power must be applied to the task of customizing an approach that can work. 

Steel recognizes the cynicism that many of us experience after wading through mountains of self-help tomes.   He references a satirical novel, Happiness, by Will Ferguson, whose premise is "What if someone wrote a self-help book that actually worked?"  But Steel maintains that The Procrastination Equation actually works, just like Ferguson's fictional character's fictional work, What I Learned on the Mountain.  But only if we actually work.  

The moment has arrived to come out of this useful book, and back into our lives.  It is time to (gulp!) put what we've learned into practice, and become former procrastinators.

At the conclusion of the chapter--the "Looking Forward" section--Dr. Steel reminds us of what we are up against:

Nine thousand years ago, procrastination didn't exist.  Back then, if we worked when motivated, slept when sleepy, and acted on other urges as they came upon us, we did so more or less adaptively.  In that golden age, our compulsions fit out daily demands like jigsaw puzzle pieces.  We were designed for that world, life before the invention of agriculture.

Makes you long for cave, doesn't it? 

Fast forward nine thousand years and that same human nature has equipped us with inclinations that are ill-suited to the everyday.  We have to-do lists filled with diets, early wake-ups, and exercise schedules, among a host of other ugly and motivationally indigestible ordeals.  Almost every aspect of our lives reflects this maddening mismatch between our desires and our responsibilities, as we overemphasize the present and sacrifice the future. 

The hope he holds out, the answer to this dilemma, lies in accepting our circumstances, our shared humanity, and "adopt[ing] advice consistent with this understanding."  That is to say, the advice contained in The Procrastination Equation, which, if you'd purchased the book, you would be "holding. . . in your hands."

Last three words in the chapter?  "Now do it." 

Next week:  Summing it up.

Procrastinating 101: The Long and the Short of It

If Dr. Piers Steel is to be believed, we procrastinators may be about to run out of excuses.  (And God knows, we love our excuses!)  It's his persuasive argument, and his damned (good) practical advice that may prove their undoing.

Procrastinating 101 has been focusing these last nine weeks on Dr. Steel's book, The Procrastination Equation:  How to Stop Putting Things Off and Start Getting Stuff Done.  If you have been following its exposition, you may remember Dr. Steel's assertion that poor impulse control is at the heart of most procrastination.  In Chapter Nine, "In Good Time:  Managing Short-term Impulses and Long-term Goals," he lays out the problem more fully, details some creative solutions, and throws in a little ancient Greek literature.  As we have come to expect, Dr. Steel is once again an eminently companionable and unassailably (I looked it up--it's really a word.) knowledgeable tour guide through these regions of Planet Procrastination.

"Impulsiveness," says Steel, "multiplies the effect of delay, making it a major determinant of the Procrastination Equation's outcome."  For those who have not yet seen Steel's formulation, and those who have but have not committed it to memory, the mathematical expression he has devised to represent his theory of procrastination looks like this:

Here low Motivation predicts the big P, Procrastination.  The other elements have been teased out in previous posts (see, particularly, Procrastinating 101: 12-year-olds Get It, So Can We ).

Impulsiveness contributes to the divisor in the equation, so that the more impulsive among us will experience lower motivation, and thus be more inclined to procrastinate.  And, as Dr. Steel warns, "you can't escape your fate.  Impulsiveness is not something you have, but something you are."  Yikes!

But there is hope, and it begins with Odysseus.  Dr. Steel recounts the preparations urged upon Odysseus by the goddess Circe, who knew that he would face, on his return trip from Troy, the temptress Sirens.  Circe advised him to plug his men's ears with wax, and to lash himself to the mast of his ship, so that he would be able to pass through the district of these irresistible creatures and continue his journey.  Thus, Odysseus employed the technique of precommitment.

Dr. Steel recommends we face the fact that temptations too often get the better of us, leading us off task and into putting off what we need to get done.  We would do well to identify our Sirens, and to invest in precommitment.

He offers three contemporary strategies (no ear wax or ship masts required) for precommitting, intriguingly categorized under the heading "Bonding, Satiation and Poison."  For the sake of brevity, and my sanity (it has been a looonnnnnngggggggg week!), I will just hit the highlights here:  

• Throw Away the Key--The idea here is to devise a way, technological or analog, to block off the exits while focusing on work.  Steel mentions, e.g., a program for Apple users called Freedom, which blocks internet access; Clocky, an alarm clock on wheels that goes berserk when you hit Snooze; and Google's "Take a break" button, which gives the user fifteen minutes of email-free work time.
• Satiation--This approach addresses our urges and impulses by having us "tank up," scheduling in a modicum of pleasure and relaxation, and then slotting in work around these "appointments."  Dr. Neil Fiore popularized this Unschedule in his book The Now Habit:  A Strategic Program for Overcoming Procrastination and Enjoying Guilt-Free Play.
• Try Poison--This strategy features penalties & scare tactics.  One example was employed by my ex-husband in his dissertation research on behavior change.  Participants put up $100, which was forfeited to their least favorite cause or charity if they resumed smoking during the study period.  Alternatively, Dr. Steel recommends visualizing in horrifying detail the dire consequences that could result from putting off a dreaded task.

Then there's "Making Attention Pay," Steel's two-pronged advice for diminishing the pull of distractions/temptations.

• Inside Out:  Pay Attention Please!--We can minimize the appeal of those objects and activities that would keep us from work by altering our perceptions, and thus the level of attention these things command.  Using abstraction and symbolic representation--e.g., focusing on attributes of a desired food, and thus recruiting the prefrontal cortex to compete with the limbic system response of "yum," "gimme"--is one way of doing this.  Another is to run a "smear campaign" on the desired object, attending to its negative qualities and consequences--e.g., weight gain and high cholesterol from junk food; STDs, unwanted pregnancy and a ruined marriage from infidelity; or public disgrace and firing from failure to complete work.
• Outside In:  Now You See It, Now You Don't (stimulus control)--This approach attempts to limit the environmental cues which distract us.  For example, a dieter might stock the fridge with only healthy food choices.  Those of us who struggle to stay on task might limit the number of windows open on our computer desktops; remove troublesome bookmarks; arrange our work spaces to cue work and not entertainment; incorporate work triggers; and--addressing two of my personal pet peeves--declutter our work space, and maintain "pristine" boundaries between "clashing life domains, typically family and work."  Hard to do for the increasing number of us who work from home, and whose laptops accompany us from one messy and distracting space and location to another.

And finally, Scoring Goals.

Dr. Steel has this to say about goals:

We have already touched on some of what makes a goal good.  In chapter 7, we mentioned that making goals challenging is more inspiring than making them attainable.  Easy goals are attainable. . . .In chapter 8, we focused on making goals meaningful by linking them to personally relevant aspirations.  If you see how present tasks lead to future rewards, you will value them more highly.  In this chapter, we will put the finishing touches on goal setting by putting time back on your side.

• The Finish Line is Just Ahead--Dr. Steel's suggestion in this section is to proceed toward "concrete, exact" goals by stages, using subgoals.  In this way, we can take advantage of our tendency to work more intensely closer to deadline; a series of intermediate "deadlines" will result in spreading out effort, and a better quality product.  He discusses the issue of "motivational surface tension," and using a technique I first learned from Alan Lakein (in How to Get Control of Your Time and Your Life)--setting a mini-goal that gets us started, and more often than not, ultimately engaged in the work we're avoiding.
• Full Auto--This advice builds on the predictability that flows from build routines and habits of work.  He also urges us to plan for distraction, as in "'If I lose focus, then I will move my attention back to the task.'"

But again, Dr. Steel says all this better than I.  You might want to just read the book yourself.

Next Week:  Chapter Ten--Making it Work.  We're in the home stretch now!

Procrastinating 101: Winning at the Job Game*

 

My favorite lines in Tom Meny's song, Job, are these:

I don't dig ditches or bang on doors
But I don't end hunger and I don't end wars
And I don't do anything that'll ever make a change

although I must confess that his refrain

I hate my job
I hate my job
I hate my job
I hate my job
I hate my job
Lord knows, I hate my f-in job

also holds a certain resonance for me.  (Of course, as with Meny's disclaimer, this has no relationship to my current, much-loved jobsss.)

Piers Steel deals with the subject of jobs in The Procrastination Equation's eighth chapter--"Love It or Leave It:  Finding Relevance in Work."  My brief YouTube survey, in search of a link, musical or otherwise, to use for this post's image turned up a host of material that supports Steel's opening point about the nature of work in the modern world.  A raft of funny, brilliant, disturbing, and in many cases explicit videos express the alienation many of us experience, whether in cubicles or warehouses, as fast food pushers, shelf stockers, telemarketers (who apparently hate themselves as much as we hate them), fry cooks, sales personnel or domestic workers.  Even children are making videos about how much they expect to hate their jobs when they grow up!

Steel tells us that about a game he uses "to warm up my students for a class on motivation . . . called My Job Is Worse Than Your Job, " and the conclusion they draw from it:  that the "worst" jobs "aren't the physically demanding ones . . . [but rather] the mind-numbingly boring ones."  Ever been bored at work?  (Of course, if you're a brain surgeon, I hope you're going to answer "No.")

Steel traces the influence of Frederick Taylor, whose efficiency studies in the late 19th and early 20th centuries led to a growing fragmentation of work--"simple routine tasks lacking autonomy."  Enter boredom, alienation, and a lack of motivation.  Enter procrastination.  (Remembering that the lower our motivation, the more we delay, according to the Procrastination Equation.)  Of course, lollygagging on an assembly line may be physically dangerous.  Think Charlie Chaplin's character's entanglement in the machinery in Modern Times.

Steel's discussion of games and tricks we might employ on the job to keep boredom at bay reminded me of a book I read many years ago called Manufacturing Consent, by Michael Burawoy.  Burawoy's Marxist analysis argued that the "gaming" used by workers in which they competed with each other to "make out" in a piece rate pay structure, "playing all the angles," gave them the illusion of choice.  

Playing the game eliminated much of the drudgery and boredom associated with industrial work.   (Manufacturing Consent, p. 89)

 Thus, in Burawoy's view, workers were diverted from concerns with labor-management conflict, their participation was co-opted--and consent was thus manufactured. 

But Dr. Steel is not addressing the workings of capitalism and labor relations.  He is looking, as psychologists do, at the experience of the individual--of us work-inured, bored procrastinators.  And his recommendation is that we game the system as a way of making work tolerable, and of shoring up motivation.  He also advocates the use of goals, and particularly positive or approach goals to enhance the relevance of our jobs, and further buttress motivation.  And he points out the usefulness of framing, or viewing tasks so as to increase the value we assign to them.

Steel goes on to discuss the matter of  available energy for tasks we dislike--physical energy as well as emotional energy.  And like Chip and Dan Heath, in Switch, he notes that willpower is depleted by the many efforts we make at self-control.  He echoes Marshall Cook, author of Slow Down. . . and Get More Done, in this statement:

To some extent, we should accept that we don't have infinite mental energy and acknowledge our motivational limitations along with our physical ones.  Everyone understands why you can't run back-to-back marathons but it's not so obvious that equivalent internal struggles can be just as onerous.  Perhaps we have trouble with procrastination because we demand too much of ourselves in a day, and it's possible that pursuing a less stressful, slower paced life would help us get energized.

But given that we "don't always have a choice," Dr. Steel offers these suggestions for managing our energy:

1.  Eliminating distractions from our work environment, so that we don't exhaust ourselves fighting constant temptation;

2.  Working with circadian rhythms to schedule tasks when our energy for them is optimal;

3.  Using short naps and/or walks to revive energy levels; and

4.  Maintaining energy with exercise and proper diet and sleep, rather than relying on junk food and stimulants to stay alert.  

He shares this fascinating tidbit:

Committing to a regular schedule of exercise has been shown to decrease procrastination

and advises learning about sleep hygiene.

Dr. Steel is also a proponent of structured procrastination, an idea advanced by John Perry, and one that I have written about previously.  This strategy, which Steel calls "productive procrastination," would have us do something worthwhile while avoiding a less palatable task, thereby reducing but not eliminating the cost of procrastinating.  Eventually, so the theory goes, this approach 

does clear your plate and puts you in a much better position to dig in when you're ready.

Before concluding this chapter about this scariest of all four-lettered words, Dr. Steel puts forth two notions to which I especially warm.  The first of these he calls "Double or Nothing," encouraging us to pair something pleasant with a hated task.  Over time, this should result in "learned industriousness."  And in the meantime, it means I can look forward to more chocolate, more meditation time, and more movies.  (Dr. Steel does not take up the recent debate about what some experts claim is the harm done to children's intrinsic motivation by the use of extrinsic rewards.  And, by extension, to our own "love" for "the work itself."  See, for example, Rewards and Praise:  The Poisoned Carrot. )

The second of these two warm and fuzzy suggestions is to "Let Your Passion Be Your Vocation."  He says that "finding work you want to do is a major step toward avoiding procrastination," and that "This combination can make work almost addictive; motivation shoots upward stratospherically, souping up creativity, learning, and persistence."  Just ask my husband, who is frequently caught in bed, late at night, highlighting the more salient sentences in books such as Histories of the Hanged:  The Dirty War in Kenya and the End of Empire.  Not my cup of tea, but then I myself can get lost for hours following Facebook links to arcane discussions of Wisconsin state politics.  My "work," as I define it, but not my "job."

Steel observes that achieving this state of work/passion, or "job/calling" congruence can be a long-term project.  Indeed, 

If we all went with or first impulse, the working world would be primarily composed of firefighters and ballerinas. [Or where I grew up, nuns.]

He counsels us to martial available resources, and make the effort to, as Marshall Cook (and the Buddha) advised, "find right work" and "make work right." 

Next week--Dr. Steel tackles impulsiveness.

_______________________________

*Note:  I should mention that I began the day at a protest rally, calling attention to the unacceptably high level of joblessness in my city, parts of which register 60% unemployment among African American males.  While some of us procrastinate on our jobs, others are in desperate need of decent, family-sustaining jobs--no matter how boring, tedious, or strenuous.

## Apropos of today's subject:  on the Red Stapler Chronicles, this list of the top 6 movies about hating your job.  Yet another procrastination resource.  Check it out.

Procrastinating 101: The Right Shade of Rose

Chapter 7 of Piers Steel's The Procrastination Equation:  How to Stop Putting Things Off and Start Getting Stuff Done bears the rosy title "Optimizing Optimism."  In this chapter, Dr. Steel moves from his dark portrait of our pesky bad habit and its costly fallout, to providing us some bread crumbs to follow on our way out of the forest.

As I begin this post, I am hemmed in by modern-day folk references, clamoring to make their way onto the virtual page.  Yellow brick roads, hobbits in Middle-earth, portkeys in mazes of TriWizarding tournaments, and snatches of theme music vie for attention.  (Can you tell I'm excited to be on the threshold of release?)  Even the superbly credentialed Dr. Steel throws in a Tortoise and a Hare and their fabled run for the roses near the outset.

But I digress.  And isn't that why I'm reading this book?

Not just nifty wordplay (for which I'm always a sucker), "optimizing optimism" refers to a set of strategies for correcting the tint on those famously pinkish-hued spectacles.  Some need to turn it down a notch or two.  Dr. Steel, quoting psychologists Michael Scheier and Charles Carver, "who have spent their lives studying optimism" (should they be called "optimologists"?  Sorry, couldn't resist.), tells us that

It may be possible to be too optimistic, or to be optimistic in unproductive ways.  For example, unbridled optimism may cause people to sit and wait for good things to happen, thereby decreasing the chance of success.

At the other end of the spectrum are those of us who expect failure, whose lack of optimism, and of self-confidence, sap motivation.  Our lenses could stand a bit more pigmentation.

This is probably a good place to feature once more, for the sake of those who haven't seen it, as well as those who haven't retained it, Dr. Steel's Procrastination Equation, for which the book is named.

Motivation, here, is the dependent variable--and inversely related to Procrastination.  I.e., the lower our motivation for a task, the greater our propensity to put it off. 

Expectancy--perceived likelihood of success--is the optimism variable.  Dr. Steel's "formula" is really a theoretical model which takes into account the vast compendium of research he has considered and/or conducted over the course of his career as a scholar of procrastination.  Because it is not possible to assign actual numerical values to the component concepts, we are not meant to use it to calculate an "amount" of motivation, or to plug in different values for, say, expectancy (optimism).

But even as a theoretical model, it begins to break down a little, in the nondoctoral opinion of this reader, with the nuanced discussion of the somewhat paradoxical effects of too much, and too little optimism.  If we read the equation as linear, greater expectancy of success (optimism) should always result in a greater degree of motivation, all else remaining constant.  I'm not really sure what Dr. Steel has in mind mathematically in his treatment of optimism, as it affects his elegant expression.

But niggling about algebraic fine points is beside the point, really.  The chapter's contribution is in helping us to right our perceptions.

Steel takes as a jumping off place the work of psychologist Jeffrey Vancouver, whose work on motivation has "succeeded in locating optimism's sweet spot"--that point where a task is seen as easy enough to be doable, but not so easy as to invite postponement.  Steel graphs Vancouver's depiction of this relationship between optimism and motivation:

Of course, optimism is something akin to a mood state, and may or may not reflect reality.  One can be overly pessimistic (kind of like an Eeyore, in Gretchen Rubin's terms--see her Happiness Project post on the distinction she draws between Tiggers and Eeyores), or falsely optimistic.  And errors of perception, resulting in flawed Expectation, can pertain to the intrinsic difficulty of a task, as well as to our own ability to accomplish it.

We begin to get down to brass tacks (Is it just me, or am I up to my neck in metaphors about now?) as Dr. Steel provides two sets of research-supported strategies, aimed, respectively, at the majority of procrastinators--who struggle with self-confidence, and are likely to have low optimism/expectation of success; and at those who live in a location he deems "Fantasy Land."  I suspect I am not the only procrastinator who suffers from both distortions, depending on the circumstances.  I suggest we all pay careful attention to all of Steel's optimizing recommendations.

For those of us whose glasses are not sufficiently rose-colored, Steel prescribes three corrective approaches:  Success Spirals, Vicarious Victories, and Wish Fulfillment.  The description of each is followed, in the book, by a set of Action Points--"pointers about how to put what you have read directly into action, easily and without delay."

A thumbnail of each:

• Success Spirals--basically, an approach that builds on successive successes.  A little like the child rearing method that would have us "catch them being good," and reward that good behavior as a foundation for increasingly virtuous actions.  Or "lowering the bar" initially, to build mounting achievement.  Or like Skinner's "shaping."  This is an approach I tried, with little success, to get my dyslexic son's teachers to adopt in dealing with his educational performance.  (Perhaps I should have tried dispensing M & M's.)
• Vicarious Victories--a strategy that relies on motivational stories, whether true or literary, and the inspiration available from membership in a group who share our challenges, and a positive focus.  Hearing about others' efforts and successes makes things seem more doable, and thus increases optimism.
• Wish Fulfillment--creative visualization, with the crucial added element of mental contrasting.  The latter 

doesn't create optimism but it maximizes optimism's motivational benefits, creating energy and effort as well as jump starting planning.  People who practice mental contrasting almost immediately start pursuing their dreams, putting a crimp in procrastination.

Space prohibits detailing Steel's useful Action Points here.  For these, I send you to the source, to THE BOOK itself.

For those in need of toning down their happy view of things, and thereby assessing more realistically their own abilities, a task's level of difficulty, and the amount of time it will take, Steel advises these two methods.  Both are intended to help us

activate the reality principle:  to confront the reality of the situation when we are seeking the best way to achieve our goals.  Invoking the reality principle is a sign that we have outgrown our childish and impulsive ways and can acknowledge the price we must realistically pay for our dreams.

• Plan for the Worst, Hope for the Best--The gist of this advice is that we acknowledge that most of us will fail along the way to achieving what we want.  This recognition can inoculate us against the disappointment and discouragement that can cause us to give up before we get where we are headed.  Expecting and planning for setbacks helps us focus on incremental achievements, using that positive energy to keep going.

• Accept that You're Addicted to Delay--Like Alcoholics Anonymous and other 12-step programs, this approach would have us take very seriously the daunting severity of our procrastination habit.  In doing so, we "improve self-control by embracing [our] pessimism."  In other words, if we up the ante on procrastination behaviors, like game-playing, for example, we force ourselves to see each small instance for the slippery slope that it truly is.  We are thus more motivated to avoid procrastinating.  Steel recommends we 

[f]ollow the Victorian era's greatest maxim:  "Never suffer an exception to occur.". . . You buttress your commitment to early starts by believing that any slip will be catastrophic, that the initial step toward procrastinating is merely the first link in an endless chain.  The specifics of tomorrow will be much the same as today:  you will be tempted to incur a small but cumulative cost to gain a moderate immediate pleasure.  If you decide to delay even once, your decision will be replicated daily and the consequences will grow.

And now I confess that false optimism led me to underestimate the amount of time this post would require to write.  However, this resulted, not in delaying the task, but in giving more of the day to it than I had planned.  Some unsung variety of planning fallacy, all my own?  The kind where all my other plans for the day have gone awry?  Oh, well.  That's why we are advised to tackle first things first, yes?

Next week, Chapter 8, "Love it or Leave It."  No, not our country, or my state, but WORK, in which we are admonished to find relevance.




## Looking for a way to make procrastination pay?  Check out this photo contest for procrastinators--Entry deadline is July 13. 

Procrastinating 101: The Horror! The Horror!

Dum da dum dum.  Or whatever sound means "impending doom" to you.  That's the appropriate lead-in to Chapter 6 of Piers Steel's The Procrastination Equation:  How to Stop Putting Things Off and Start Getting Stuff Done.

In this grimmest chapter yet, entitled "The Economic Cost of Procrastination:  How Businesses and Nations Lose," Dr. Steel builds on the dark ground of Chapter 5.  Here, the focus goes macro, and we are confronted with an estimated societal bill for our collective procrastination.  Dr. Steel highlights our losses in the areas of work-time frittered away, savings postponed, and political procrastination.  The most haunting instance of the latter is the blind official eye being turned to the increasingly imminent threat of "environmental depletion and destruction."

Using relatively conservative figures, Dr. Steel arrives at the somewhat stupefying number $1,264,1200,000,000  [sic], which represents the value of time lost annually in the U.S. as a result of employees procrastinating on the job.  He goes on to detail some of what "workers" are doing, instead of working.  The list includes "video snacking," visiting pornographic sites, social networking, game playing, and excessive--and disruptive--email checking.  Some of us make use of technology to hide our technological abuses, like a "Boss Key," which allows the dawdler to quickly switch the screen to feign legitimate activity should said boss poke his pointy little head into one's cubicle. 

Dr. Steel's discussion of procrastination related to retirement savings essentially drills down on the previous chapter's mention of compound interest--which, he reminds us, Einstein "called the eighth wonder of the world."  Dr. Steel provides a dismal portrait of how the average American shoots him/herself in the financial foot on which the "golden years" must stand, by failing to save in time for this eventuality.  This fiduciary profligacy is "compounded," but not in a good way, by the host of other bad decisions these financial grasshoppers are likely to make.  Like signing up for variable rate mortgages; borrowing against houses and meager retirement funds; and relying on "pay day" loans, which can expose the borrower to annual interest rates of more than 500 percent.

Steel does hint at how such individual financial procrastination, in the aggregate, affects the economy as a whole, in this statement:  "Furthermore, since the dollars you save are invested, savings can help the nation as a whole, spurring economic expansion."  

However, I would be interested in seeing this relationship explored more deeply.  Clearly, the way so many of us mishandle our money, partly as a result of procrastination (though perhaps more as a result of mechanisms of capitalism), has repercussions for the health of our own economy, and globally--something demonstrated all too painfully in recent years.  And it is noteworthy that many who did not put off saving for retirement have found themselves, nevertheless, woefully under resourced at the planned-for end of their working lives, thanks to Enron, 401-K collapses, and pension defaults.  A diminishing sense of investment efficacy, along with a tendency to put off preparations, may be at work in the decline in savings, and in saving.

In his section on political procrastination, Dr. Steel reports some horrifying projections of what begins to read like an ecological apocalypse.  By the year 2050, an anticipated three-degree increase in temperature is expected to have a "mutilating" effect on the planet.

No matter what country you are in, there won't be any place that will truly benefit from this change.  Entire ecosystems, like the Amazon rainforest, are expected to collapse, about a third of all animals and plants will become extinct, and billions of famine refugees will fight to determine who starves to death first.

In the context of this urgent issue, the likelihood that our political institutions will continue to drag their feet leaves little room for hope.

But Dr. Steel finds some, in, oddly, bicameralism--which is intended to force legislatures to act more deliberately, and theoretically, less impulsively in the face of serious issues having long-term ramifications; in the growing policy role of behavioral economics; and in Obama's rhetoric about our need "to confront problems, not to pass them on to future presidents and future generations."  And yet, similar language, which urges us to stop "kicking the can [of public debt] down the road" to our children, is being used in my state to justify actions that will further enrich the privileged and increase the suffering of the vulnerable.

The stops on this week's post-industrial tour added to last week's panorama of personal devastation bring two things to mind.  One is the happy little industry of Katrina tours still extant in my second home of New Orleans.  The other is a quote from Winston Churchill, which has rearranged itself in my head thusly:

We shall go on to the end; we shall [procrastinate] in France,

we shall [procrastinate] on the seas and oceans,

we shall [procrastinate] with growing [consequences] and growing [slothfulness] in the air. . . .

we shall [procrastinate] on_ the beaches,

we shall [procrastinate] on the landing grounds,

we shall [procrastinate] in the fields and in the streets,

we shall [procrastinate] in the hills;

we shall never [catch up].

I am looking forward to Dr. Steel's next chapter, on "Optimizing Optimism," in which he promises to begin showing us the way out of the morass he has so persuasively depicted.