Books for procrastination/self-defeating help

June 21, 2017 9:16 AM

Please recommend books for help with procrastination/self-defeating thinking; specifically the feeling that "it's too late" to do anything.

I frequently go through this self-defeating cycle: (1) fall behind on a project; (2) become afraid/paralyzed by the feeling that I have fallen behind; (3) become afraid/avoidant of even picking up the project because I don't want to review all of the things that I should have done earlier/have an overwhelming feeling that "it's too late" to fix. I know intellectually that this turns relatively small/minor stumbles into much larger problems. What books would you recommend for breaking this cycle? I find most useful very practical/down-to-earth approaches - i.e., not a lot of psycology but a specific step-by-step approach. I have read GTD a few times - that's at the right level of "practicality" for me, if that helps. Thanks

posted by Mid to Human Relations (13 answers total)

I FEEL YOU.

I am still thinking about book recommendations, but I wanted to gently say that sometimes trying to find books to help with a problem is just another way of putting off dealing with the problem. In this case, the problem is that you get too overwhelmed to just do the thing, right, and the solution is to just do the thing. You do one thing at a time, one minute at a time and in the end no amount of reading is going to do it for you.

But you might already know that and you're just seeking inspiration and new ways to think about it, so I will say that Anne Lamott's writing book Bird by Bird helped me somewhat with the whole idea of the shitty first draft (which is writing advice but can also be doing the things advice when viewed a certain way). Lamott is also just so very gentle and funny and smart with her pushing and her forgiveness. I, like you, tend to look to books for help dealing with these problems (despite my advice up there), and I have never found a business-y book that really does it for me, though GTD certainly makes me feel... hopeful, I guess. Other writing books help, too, with their push to get a thing done (it's writing, sure, but so often writing advice is circling around and around "get your butt in the chair and stop being so afraid").

Anyway, good luck and I hope you find ways to manage this. For me, it's always been a well managed to do list and timers and peace, down at the bottom.
posted by hought20 at 10:04 AM on June 21, 2017 [8 favorites]

The Now Habit by Neil Fiore is the best I know for this.
posted by heatherlogan at 10:24 AM on June 21, 2017 [10 favorites]

Seconding the Now Habit. Seriously, scheduling fun is the only way I have found to get out of this rut.
posted by peacheater at 10:35 AM on June 21, 2017

A different approach, and one that's worked exceedingly well for me for many years, involves learning to unleash the avoidant personality's full potential: Structured Procrastination.
posted by flabdablet at 11:42 AM on June 21, 2017 [3 favorites]

Slightly broader than just 'procrastination', but for the self-defeating aspect I found books on cognitive behavioral therapy really helpful. 'The Feeling Good Handbook' by David D. Burns is a good starting point.

Also, more on a procrastination tip, I enjoyed 'One Small Step Can Change Your Life: The Kaizen Way' by Robert Maurer, which at it's essence is all about focusing on the small things you can do to get the big job done.
posted by AllTheQuestions at 12:39 PM on June 21, 2017 [2 favorites]

Unlike AllTheQuestions, I despise straight cognitive behavioral therapy, partly because my mind just doesn't work like that. I feel like it assumes something is happening in my mind that isn't. I don't have panic attacks because of getting stuck in some thought loop, I have panic attacks that start in my body/physical brain.

However I would recommend The_Dialectical_Behavior_Skills_Workbook or some other DBT skills workbook. DBT doesn't make me feel like I am trying to change my thoughts or feelings by fooling myself.
posted by Altomentis at 1:30 PM on June 21, 2017 [4 favorites]

Altomentis, I'm sorry CBT didn't work for you. I never felt like I was fooling myself it just made me very conscious of the negative, completely pointless thought patterns that were swirling around in my head. Hopefully the OP can look at all the suggestions and find what works for them.
posted by AllTheQuestions at 4:23 PM on June 21, 2017

This is me, too!

I don't have any book recs yet, but I've just started digging into the topic, and wanted to point you to this article, which summarizes a research paper and may be of interest: A Neuropsychological Perspective on Procrastination.

The main idea is that procrastination is not a failure of will, but rather a failure of executive function. Executive function is a group of of self-regulatory cognitive processes that help you get through tasks, such as planning, attention, problem solving, initiating & terminating, inhibition, self-monitoring, troubleshooting, cognitive flexibility, etc. It can be impaired because of various disorders—ADHD, autism spectrum disorders, etc.—but, of course, individual ability in executive function exists along a continuum, and some people may just be weaker in it. The article points to how procrastination is linked to specific failures in executive function and suggests possible strategies.

So, in addition to procrastination books, it might be helpful to further look up "executive function" (or, rather, "executive dysfunction").
posted by stellarc at 6:41 PM on June 21, 2017 [2 favorites]

The Lifelong Activist by Hilary Rettig is a fantastic book on overcoming your inner gremlins and finding joyful productivity. She also has a great website where you can find a lot of material from the book.
posted by coffee_monster at 12:52 AM on June 22, 2017 [1 favorite]

Tim Urban on Wait But Why did three mammoth blog posts about procrastination a few years back, and they have summed up the problem and possible solutions as good as just about anything else I've seen on the subject. (At least for me.)

Part 1 - Why Procrastinators Procrastinate
Part 2 - How to Beat Procrastination
Part 3ish - The Procrastination Matrix
posted by helloimjennsco at 7:05 AM on June 22, 2017 [4 favorites]

Enthusiastically seconding most of the stuff recommended upthread - even the CBT stuff, give it a whirl, it's an empirical question whether it will work for you or not. Procrastination as protection (from disappointment, from boredom, from the unbearable anxiety of rushed work, from your own inner critic, what have you) is a species of resistance. I found Steven Pressfield's The War of Art very helpful in getting a handle on my own resistance. Not perfect, and of course an Alexandrian library of procrastination advice won't help if you don't put any of it into practice, but it's a start.
posted by All hands bury the dead at 2:09 PM on June 22, 2017

Gah, missed the editing window on my comment above, but I wanted to add:
It may also help to think of the falling-behind part of these projects not as an overwhelming amount of More Work or a referendum on your character, but as just adding a few more concrete steps to the project. If this is common for you (and judging by the number of faves this Ask has garnered, it is super common for lots of people, so believe me when I say that falling behind on projects is not going to make the world collapse), then plan to fail! Make a list of the steps that need to be added to Generic Project if the person doing it has fallen behind:
- re-assess timeline with a realistic amount of "buffer time" to accommodate managing procrastination
- email relevant parties with an updated timeline and/or an apology
- schedule work blocks and project milestones into a calendar
You may come up with a completely different list of steps, but you get the idea.
posted by All hands bury the dead at 2:23 PM on June 22, 2017

Thirding The Now Habit, mostly to mention that, despite its title, the book is in no way a "just do it" guide. Instead, it gets into the fear of looking, the building pressure, and the other feelings that make us engage in this seemingly illogical behavior.
posted by mabelstreet at 3:42 PM on June 23, 2017