Four Reasons Why We Procrastinate

By Carol Halsey

Have you ever spent time thinking about a task you need to tackle but keep putting off, then spend time telling yourself you just must get started and wondering when you will start it, and then feeling guilty because you are working on other tasks instead. Yet this one keeps hanging over your head. If this sounds familiar, you may be one of the many people who procrastinate, and procrastination is probably the biggest time waster.

Putting off the inevitable, sometimes until a deadline is staring you in the face, causes the highest stress level, and results in managing time by crises. There are many reasons why people procrastinate. For some it happens occasionally under specific circumstances, and for others, it is a way of life. Here we will explore a few of the reasons behind why people procrastinate.

1. Poor work habits. These people procrastinate on everything. They are so far behind that they are constantly trying to keep up with yesterday. Boy, talk about high stress!! Their response is usually, “I work best under pressure.” If the truth be known, they are poor organizers and have trouble prioritizing tasks and scheduling their time. It is easier to wait until the last minute to start a task because in their mind it is now important.

2. Feeling overwhelmed. When we don’t know how to do something, it is easier not to do anything at all. Or maybe we feel it would be too time consuming to learn what is needed to accomplish a particular task. It seems like it would take forever to complete. This is the time to break the task down into manageable parts. Decide a starting point and work for short periods of time, say 10 to 20 minutes. Then check off each part as completed. This imparts the feeling of accomplishment as work is being completed.

3. Trying to be perfect. What may be the goal of the perfectionist may well be looked on by others as nitpicking. Perfectionists usually see their responsibilities as burdens, making it more difficult for them to accomplish tasks in a timely manner. They start tasks but put off completion until it meets their standards for perfection. However, these standards are most likely not recognized or appreciated by others, and thereby the perfectionist has wasted a lot of time to accomplish the unnecessary.

The perfectionist could strive for excellence rather than perfection. Excellence is defined as “very good of its kind” or ” high-quality performance.” Perfection is defined as “the condition of being flawless” which is not impossible, but most unlikely to achieve. Focus on what is realistic rather than what is ideal. Do the best you can in the time allowed. The time investment should be appropriate to the magnitude of the task or project.

4. Rather do something else. Unfortunately, we all dislike certain tasks that we have to do anyway. It could be filing, expense reports, or writing a report. So we keep putting it off, wishing it would go away. Think what would happen by delaying all unpleasant duties. After a while, their numbers build up to where that’s all there is to do. Then everything is unpleasant. Consider the consequences of not doing the unpleasant task. Recognize that it will not go away, but just delaying the inevitable.

Identify why you procrastinate on a particular task or project - do you hate it, are you feeling overwhelmed by a pending deadline, have a fear of failure, or are you just waiting for the ‘right time’ to start. Try setting aside a half hour a day to get started on whatever you are putting off. By working a half hour at a time, you will overcome the overwhelmed feeling and increase the momentum to work faster.

Consider the risks of waiting for that last minute ‘high.’ What if you got sick, priorities changed, or an unexpected crises or event developed. Recall the nightmare experienced the last time you procrastinated until the last minute.

When we procrastinate, we get behind before we even start, and create a major time problem.

My Introduction to Podcasts

I was bored one day while I was on the Internet and I came across a link for a tech related podcast.   I had never before looked into these podcast things before, but they are actually quite cool and I have become addicted to these things.  Also, it is great for people with ADD, because it’s like reading a web article while you are doing other stuff.  So listening to Podcasts is about as close to multitasking as I am going to get.  

Anyways the intent of this entry is to let everyone out there know about the cool and informative Podcasts I have discovered.  Most everyone will think these are boring because they are mostly tech related.  But tech stuff is what I like and that is what I listen to.  And last time I checked, this was my blog so I can write about what I want.

The easiest way I have found to search for, subscribe to, and download Podcasts is iTunes.  I know, I am not usually a Mac person, but I am really starting to like iTunes as their UI and usability and very sleek and efficient.  There are also other podcast listening software out there such as Juice and iPodder.  The reason I chose iTunes because of use and the ability to organize and update all my different Podcasts.  Also what is cool about Podcasts is that you can transfer over to your Mp3 players and listen to them on the go.

After about a week of listening to different Podcasts, I have subscribed to about 10 or so.  Some of these have new episodes daily or weekly or monthly.  But most come out with a new episode each week.  I have even subscribed to a couple of video Podcasts.  As for the different Podcasts I listen to they vary from tech related stuff to digital photography to the Lost television series.

The first podcast I subscribed and listened to was by Leo Laporte, “the Tech Guy”.  He used to be a regular on the cable channel TechTV back before it changed to G4TV.  He hosts a call-in talk show out in LA.  People call him up with their tech problems/questions and help them out.  He also has another podcast called “The Week in Tech”.  It features three other TechTV Alums as they have a “roundtable discussion” about the various news in tech for the week.  These are really enjoyable for the person who likes to keep up with the cutting edge technology and gadgets.  

Anyways, I could go on all day and talk about all the different Podcasts I listen to.  But I have to other stuff too.  So I will just all the current Podcasts I am subscribed to with a brief description and who knows maybe you will actually find one of them interesting and helpful.

Michael’s current top Podcasts:

1. KFI Tech Guy          No one does a better job of explaining technology, computers, and the                  Internet than Leo Laporte. This podcast is of his twice weekly three-hour talk show on KFI AM 640 in Los Angeles, minus traffic reports, news, and commercials.

1. This Week in Tech          Your first podcast of the week is the last word in tech. Join Leo Laporte, Patrick Norton, Kevin Rose, John C. Dvorak, and other tech luminaries in a roundtable discussion of the latest trends in high tech. Winner of People's Choice Podcast and Best Technology Podcast in the 2005 People's Choice Podcast Awards. Released every Sunday at midnight Pacific.

1. Diggnation:          Diggnation is a weekly tech/web culture show based on the top digg.com social bookmarking news stories. Hosted by Kevin Rose & Alex Albrecht.

1. DL.TV               By tech fans, for tech fans: product reviews, tech tips, viewer questions, gaming and great guests, all brought to you by Patrick Norton, Robert Heron and the DigitalLife TV crew.

1. The transmission – Lost podcast     This LostCast covers the latest new episode of LOST - plot summaries, story speculation, and spoilers (with warnings!).

1. Digital Photography Tips from the Top Floor     Award-winning, short and sweet - with non-techy tips that you can put to use immediately. This PocastAward-winning show covers everything from image composition to post processing. No matter if you use a digital point-and-shoot or an expensive digital SLR.  With a good sense of humour, Chris Marquardt manages to convey tips for the beginner as well as the professional photographer.

Well that is all for this entry.  Check back in another six months for my next blog entry, just kidding.

Working and ADD

I have found, over the years, that my ADD affects my productivity at work. To begin with my job is very boring and uneventful. There is no challenge to it, which is the worst thing for someone with ADD. Someone like me needs to do something that I enjoy and find interesting so it will hold my attention, which is very hard to do. I have read on other sites that if an ADD person is doing something they enjoy that they have amazing focus. If I am not doing something interesting, I can not get anything done. I find myself distracting myself with other things, I get sidetracked easily. Even writing this blog entry today is difficult, and when you read it, you will find that I am writing all over the place and do not make any sense.

Also I have amazingly powerful weird memory skills. I can remember what I wore or did on a certain day like when I was 5, but sometimes I cant remember what I wore yesterday. Sometimes when I open up my browser to go to a site to check something out, I will forget what I went online to see, or I will get distracted by reading something on the homepage. Also I can remember obscure facts and trivia about meaningless things. I tell people I have a memory super powers but I cant harness my powers to do good things for me like when I was in school for classes or use it for work. I guess I need to defrag the drive in my brain and do a disk cleanup.

Some people say I use my ADD as an excuse or "crutch" , if you will. But I seriously believe I have some kind of problem. I have read all the symptoms on various ADD sites and I am doing most of them what they say. That is why I think it would be hard for me to find one job that I would truly enjoy doing for a career. My interests in what I like doing change almost daily. Sometimes I like working with computers and other times I would like to do something tennis related. I also enjoy working in the yard and doing projects around the house and building stuff. It really drives me crazy sometimes not being able to settle down and enjoy doing one thing. My mind is thinking about doing so many other things at once that end up overloading, crashing, and end up getting nothing done in the end.

Well that is enough for now I will add some more later. Later!

Back from my Vacation

Well, I am back from my week and a half vacation to beautiful St. Pete Beach, and it was very nice. We did go back home for a couple days for Hurricane Dennis, while it passed by. First of all, I was pleased to see when we arrived that the red tide was not very bad at all. We stayed in a condo of a friend of ours which was really nice and had its own private beach. It is much nicer to have a condo, because you have a kitchen and other stuff, so it is almost like a regular house as compared to a hotel, and much cheaper. There were really good waves the first 5 days we were there until the hurricane was gone. The rest of the week the water was flat, crystal clear, and very relaxing. I was very pleased I could get in a decent amount of boogie boarding in during the early part of my trip

Prior to our trip I got a new Morey Boogie boogie board at Sam's Club. I got it at a very good price. It really made a difference out on the waves compared to my old generic boogie board that I got a few years ago. On Monday after hurricane Dennis was some of the best waves of the trip. I got in a good 3 hours of boarding in the afternoon. While out there I met another guy, looked to be in his forties. He was a local and he was the only one besides me who was boogie boarding. All the others out there were surfers, which I stay away from because those things are dangerous if you get in the way of them. Anyways, the other boogie boarder I met out there was very good and gave me lots of pointers on how to read the waves and how to ride them better. It really helped as I have never received any advanced instruction on proper boogie boarding. I was kind of disappointed that day was the last day of that swell, as the rest of our vacation was very flat, but my wife was glad of that. She was getting tired of me being out there all afternoon boogie boarding. But I warned her on the way out to the beach that there was only going to be a couple days during the hurricane where there is going to be awesome waves and that the rest of the week would be flat. A great site to check out if you are interested in Gulf coast surfing is Gulfster. They have daily surf reports, photos, and also live beach cams.

Well enough about boogie boarding. Some of the things we did while on our vacation was my wife and I drove down to Ft. Desoto beach because I had never seen it and heard that it was recently voted the #1 beach in the country. That is hard to believe a beach here would be better than the beaches in Hawaii. My wife had been there many times as a child but not in recent years. We got there and it was very beautiful and quiet and also bigger than I thought it would be. We parked and I walked out to the beach to check it out. When I got out there it was very nice and found out why it is the #1 beach in America. It was the first time I had ever been to a beach and looked back from the water and saw no resorts or hotels, but just land. I t was very natural and quiet, like you were on your own tropical island in the middle of nowhere. It looked liked the way I would imagine Florida looked when it was first discovered. When I got back to the car I told my wife that we are definitely coming back here. The rest of the park is also very nice and very clean. There are multiple beaches there to choose from and you can also visit the Fort which looked pretty neat. There is also so many other things to do at the park also so check out the link above.

We also went to a couple restaurants while there that I will tell you about. One night when early in our trip we got a pizza at Gennaro's down the road in Passe a Grille. Another night we dined at the famous Habana Cafe in Gulfport. They serve authentic Cuban food and it was very delicious as was the sangria, I definitely recommend this place. We also tried some grouper sandwiches from Red Grouper that claim to have the best grouper sandwich. It was ok but certainly not best.

That is about it for my vacation to the beach. Most of the days we just swam in the ocean or pool or went for a walk down the beach and during the middle hot part of the day we would lounge around the condo and relax. Later.....

Suffering from Bloggers block!

I have been suffering from Bloggers block today so hopefully tomorrow I will have an entry to share. Perhaps A blog is not meant for those with ADD, who can barely keep up with their life as it is, let alone writing about it everyday.

Some ADD humor, enjoy!

Here’s more of the “You know you have ADHD when..” series. From the Greater Rochester Attention Deficit Disorder Association via Megan Dlugokinski

Here’s a few of them. You know you have ADD when:

you go to your first ADD Support Group meeting and you get whiplash from nodding your head up and down in the first 10 minutes

you have lost your cars keys more than once in the last 10mins.

you don’t have to buy and write out Christmas cards this year…because you just found last year’s stamped and ready to mail…in the trunk.

you can’t remember what you got up for until you sit down again.

you spend two hours making a complicated list with flow charts and fopotnotes which organizes your next week, including meal planning and budget… and loose the only copy

you’re consistently 20 min late to the therapist and you’re located across the street.

you actually make a list of 20 things to get done at work, or home and at the end of the day nothing is crossed off because you did 30 things you didn’t have on you list. (Have any of you ever added those things to your list to feel better?)

Doppler 9000 is the best doppler radar site for central Florida

Doppler 9000

If you need to see the current radar for Florida and bay area counties then check out Baynews9.com. The graphics on the radar are great as well as the different radars you can choose from

Welcome to my Blog

Hello everyone, welcome to my blog. I hope you find my blog somewhat informative and compelling. This is just an introductory entry. There will be more soon.