Habitual Timeboxing

Usually, I procrastinate by leaving things till the end of the day. And when that comes I'm usually so tired that I swear a lot at my morning self who got me into this mess.

Procrastination happens when you have to do something but you don't want to do it. So, you postpone it for as long as possible. You might wait for "motivation" to come. Or for the rush of a deadline to become that motivation. More often than not, procrastination is a sign of a lack of internal desire to tackle the problem. It usually means that you don't have enough willingness to do a thing, so you wait for something external to give you a push.

There's multiple ways you could tacke that. And there's great resources on how to beat procrastination and form great habits. Atomic habits is probably the most famous books on the topic. It's very well written and gives excellent advice on the matter.

Something that I found works for me though, is what's called "habitual timeboxing". It's when you allocate certain hours of the day for a certain task. Say, you want to do a weekly cleaning of your apartment. It's going to be a lot easier for you if you schedule a couple hours on Saturday morning for the task and try to stick to that routine. Our mind falls into pattern and before you know it - each Saturday morning you'll find it easier and easier to get to your big cleaning chore. On the other hand, if you do it randomly thoughout the week - it will take a lot more consious effort on your part to manage your procrastination.

Basically, if you do a bit of scheduling and allocate time for tasks - it will become easier to stick to a pattern of behaviour. It will also require a lot less of your will power to make yourself do things. And your will power is a finite resource that has a tendency to deplete at some point. And then the splurges come.

This post is part of the #100days project, where I try to write a post a day. Today is #day20