Page 145 - End Procrastination Now Get it Done with a Proven Psychological Approach

6

Powerful Behavioral Techniques

to Curb Procrastination

strip of wallpaper is slowly pulling away from your wall. You
A decide to paste it back to the wall. But first you’ll have to buy
paste, get out your papering tools, and then paste down the wall-
paper. You scratch your head. This seems like too much work right
now. You’ll get to it later. Meanwhile, you dig night crawlers for
fishing and then go fishing. When you return, the wallpaper is still
on your mind. Pulling nut weed from your lawn seems more ap-
pealing. Weeks later, you continue to find ways to delay. Is pasting
the wallpaper strip a big deal? Absolutely not. You could do it while
you are half asleep. Yet you find that the longer you put it off, the
harder it seems to get started and finish.
Behavioral diversions are a distinctive feature of procrastina-
tion. To avoid discomfort, you play solitaire. Instead of concentrat-
ing and taking notes in a lecture, you doodle. And these are not
just trivial substitute activities; behavioral diversions are a big part
of health procrastination, where you put off developing healthy
lifestyle habits that will increase your health and happiness.
These diversions are not always simply detours from making
healthy lifestyle changes. Sometimes the results of these diver-