Procrasti-learning in action!

“Procrasti-learning”

Denise Duffield Thomas

The term procrasti-learning, coined by Denise Duffield Thomas, refers to our ability to go on (and on) researching and learning about a topic to put off taking action on a task or project while justifying this to ourselves by calling it “research”. Alternatively, procrasti-learning can present as delaying starting a project by finding something unrelated “but essentially important” that you need to learn about “right now”.

How do I know if I’m a procrasti-learner? Here are some clues…

• Building a website could be your specialist subject on Mastermind but you haven’t yet registered the domain name for your new business idea.

• Your calendar reminds you that you have 3 follow-up calls to make after a networking event this week, but learning how to make pasta from scratch for the evening meal becomes an essential way to spend the afternoon (and the chances are you’ll still rip open the packet of dried fusilli come 7pm)

• You have no idea where the last 4 hours have gone, but you can now explain what the little coloured squares at the bottom of toothpaste tubes are for.

Why do we do it?

Like most forms of procrastination, procrasti-learning is a way of managing the fear associated with our work being judged, which we can perceive as personal judgement. We can tell ourselves that we are positively and proactively learning about a topic that is essential to the success of our business (and the interwoven personal success). That we are making progress and moving forwards and that we will take action when the time is right and we know EVERYTHING. Internally we have the perfect justification that we are busy and productive while not actually having to put our work “out there” for judgement.

Tips to break the procrasti-learning habit…

Image by @kellysikkema

1. Prepare a list of the essential things you think you need to learn at the beginning of a new task or project, then set a “stop researching, start doing” deadline. Share this deadline with an accountability partner who you trust to tell you to “stop faffing” and then learn all that you can up to that deadline. After which it’s ACTION, ACTION, ACTION.

2. Flip your mindset - dive into the project or task first and then adopt a just-in-time approach to learning as you go.

3. Reward yourself - if you genuinely love learning new things, give yourself the gift of a new and unrelated learning experience AFTER you have completed the task/project you’ve been procrastinating on - just don’t use this time to procrasti-learn about your next big scary task!

4. Take a sheet of paper and divide it into two columns. In the first column, write down all the subject areas you are knowledgeable about and interested in. In the second column write down the name of at least one other person in your network who also knows a lot about your subjects of interest. Next time you are tempted to start “researching” and diving deeper, email or message that person and then keep working until the response comes in. There’s a good chance that a) you’ll answer your own question and b) you’ll have finished the task before the reply hits your in box. If the reply suggests a modification to your task - it’s a quick update and not a reason to dive off down the nearest rabbit hole.

5. Change state, and go for a walk/do a workout, getting those endorphins flowing will help to embed your learning and encourage action on returning to the task.

Think you would benefit from peer accountability? Check out The Club Networkout sessions

Finding the keystone habit

Habit experts like Charles Duhigg, James Clear and Mark Manson may call them different names but they agree on the importance of finding keystone or compound habits and making them stick.

What are keystone habits?

Not all habits are created equal, some will generate a much bigger return on the energy and discipline you invest than others. They hold other habits in place (like the keystone in an archway) and, as you might anticipate, can be the catalyst for habit collapse if removed.

Keystone habits can be different for everyone

Life would be wonderful if it was as simple as choosing from a list of established habits, but keystone habits can be as unique and unusual as you are.

My keystone habit is to exercise for at least 20 minutes as soon as my alarm goes off at 6.30am. It doesn’t matter whether I run, do a yoga practice or swing a kettlebell, it’s more about the sense of achievement, the reinforcement of myself as a “someone who has a healthy lifestyle” and having a “small win” early in the day. On the days I exercise early, my day just flows better, I choose better fuel for my body - a banana rather than a biscuit. I am more energised to “eat the frog” - that big task on on the to do list and my stress levels remain in check. This domino effect on other habits and reinforcement of the identity I want to have are two of the key elements defining a keystone habit - that first domino in the chain. The one worthy of investing effort and energy into knowing that the resulting ripple effect brings rewards way beyond that initial investment.

How to identify your keystone habits

To find your keystone habits:

• look for behaviours that have a ripple effect on other behaviours

• consider how you see yourself when you do a particular habit - does it reinforce or reduce your self image as “a runner” “ a healthy eater” “a productive person”

• think back to your perfect day and keep a note of what felt like a small win or keep a note of small wins over a week and then look for a pattern - what did you do consistently on those days

Habits can be positive or negative. Keystone habits can reinforce good habits or enable destructive bad habits. Use this matrix adapted from one created by Matt Lewin’s article on Medium.com to reflect on your habits. The presence of a “good” keystone habits will inhabit the right hand side of the matrix.

Keystone Habit Matrix

Those of “a certain age” will remember the 70’s Children’s Game - Buckaroo. It shared a stable (sorry!) with the likes of Mousetrap, Ker-Plunk, the incredibly well named, Frustration, and Operation. The games you took in to play on the last day of school.

Many Scottish households have had the last day of school this week, and with it perhaps a slight easing of pressure associated with the myriad roles being undertaken by many in Lock-down - worker, parent, teacher, entertainer to name but a few.

In a conversation this morning, the person I was chatting with referred to having had “a buckaroo kind of week”. This immediately took me back to childhood and a memory of the plastic mule quietly bearing more and more load until something as innocent and unassuming as a miniature water canteen, triggers an apparently disproportionate reaction. And in that instance, I got it!

There have been days and yes, sometimes weeks, during lock-down when on the surface it looks like I have “lost" the heid” , at the sight of a plate that has failed to make it into the sink. That plate is my plastic water canteen. It represents failing to recognise that I have become overloaded and need to take time to carefully and gently remove the guitar, spade, saddle and cowboy hat that represent the other tasks and roles that I have wordlessly accepted as mine and mine alone.

What I do to answer overwhelm…

1. Recognise that I am feeling overwhelmed, name it and then STOP

2. Get out for a walk or run as soon as possible

3. Capture the ideas that pop up during my walk/run in my Movement and Mind Journal

4. Use the endorphin buzz from my exercise to focus and write down all the tasks and to-dos that are in my mind, my calendar and notebook in one place. The act of gathering and writing it down in one place often turns the mountain (as seen in my mind) into a molehill

5. Decide whether I NEED to do it as opposed to WANT to for some weird reason like “the person won’t like me anymore if I don’t” !

6. Decide if I WANT to do it, even if I don’t NEED to because I will grow from it in some way or it’s just plain enjoyable

7. Identify if someone else can do it and ASK FOR HELP

8. Hold up each task left on my list against my purpose and decide on priority based on how it will impact - this reinforces WHY I’m doing something and helps me discard or de-prioritise things that don’t immediately serve my purpose.

Movement and Mind Journal