Procrastination is the silent killer of dreams
And in my case, it’s probably a serial killer too. It’s taken me a while to write this post because, yes, I admit it – I’m a procrastinator.
Procrastination is easily the top dream assassin for course creators.
You have a fantastic idea for a course – it’s a great one. You can see yourself teaching it with ease because it’s a topic you know well. You know there’s an audience out there ready and waiting to buy it. And you’ve mapped it all out and put together a plan to create the content – all you need to do is get started.
And before you know it instead of checking off the daily tasks you’ve allocated to your course, days have gone by with nothing to show for it.
You’re stuck wondering if you’ll ever get started. And with every day you stay stuck in that place you start to doubt yourself.
You tell yourself yet again that you’ll start tomorrow, but just like yesterday, tomorrow never comes. And because tomorrow never comes the negative self-talk and internal mean-girl starts up. Then one day turns to two, two turns into a week, a week turns into months until eventually, you quit. Sound familiar?
It sounds familiar to me because that’s exactly what happens to me every.single.time I want to create something new.
There’s always a deeper issue at play
But the thing about procrastination is that most people think they lack motivation, or they’re lazy or just plain tired.
But procrastination is a symptom of a deeper problem. And just like weeds in a garden – if you don’t get them all out – they’ll just grow right back.
It’s only when you get to the root of why you can’t seem to get started creating that course content that you’ll start to make the progress you know you need to.
And what is at the root of your procrastination problem? It’s because you’re scared.
You see procrastination isn’t a time management problem but a coping mechanism. When we procrastinate, we’re avoiding what we perceive to be an unpleasant task. So, we do something else and that gives us a temporary mood boost.
What to do when you’re procrastinating
At this moment – I know I have 5 videos to record for a new offer I’m creating. But because I HATE recording videos – what am I doing? Writing a post about procrastination. That’s right, I’m procrastinating by writing a post about procrastination.
I need to figure out why I’m scared to record those videos so that I can move forward. The root of my problem with recording those videos is that I’m scared they won’t be perfect. And the worst part about this is that I tell my clients that their videos don’t need to be perfect – because they don’t!
This is very typical of people prone to procrastination. We tend to be less compassionate toward ourselves. So, I’m going to treat myself like I would treat one of my own clients. With compassion. I’m going to forgive myself for writing this post instead of recording the videos. And then I’m going to just record the first 5 minutes of the first video and if it’s not perfect – that’ll be fine.
To quote a line from one of my all-time favourite movies, Babe.
So, when you find yourself mean-girling yourself for procrastinating, try forgiving yourself instead. Then figure out what it is that you’re scared of and be kind – you’re just protecting yourself after all.