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Moving through procrastination not easily but expensively

I've just finished reading an article posted up on the davidco.com website from a coach Meg Edwards about the issue she had with an engine light on her car. She talks about the anxiety it created and from what I've read it seems the cost as apposed to the planning of the next action steps that put her off talking this issue.

I then remembered a massive event very similar to this that happened to me BUT the outcome wasn't as satisfying and nor did I feel happier with myself.

You see this happened around 3 years ago and as I look back now was only one of many ridiculous events in my life where sticking my head in the sand really didn't work.

I owned a Mitsubishi, one of those rally types. I imported it into the UK as I couldn't wait for Mitusbishi UK to finalise their partnership with an importer. I was desperate for this car. It was so new that they hadn't even decided how often you needed to get it serviced.

To cut a very long story short this car drank oil closely to how fast it drank fuel. It did have an engine oil light but would only come on when the car became dangerously low. Advice given to me was to check the oil monthly. I didn't. I waited for the oil light to tell me when the car needed oil after all thats what the light is there for. Of course everything would be fine. That was a mistake. I knew in the back of my mind (hey it reminded me) to check the oil monthly but I simply ignored it. The engine blew up. After a very expensive bill the engine was rebuilt and the keys handed back to me.

The crazy thing that I still can't explain this is I didn't learn my lesson. I STILL didn't check the oil monthly despite the gapping hole in my finances. Six months later the engine blew up again. The engine was rebuilt and I vowed to myself never again. Twelve months later the engine went again and it was time to sell it even in its current state. I couldn't aford the get it repaired.

That was three years ago and I've only just discovered GTD. I'm half way through the book. I've got the audio CD's and listen to these at every opportunity I can. Forget the Rocky CD in the gym - I listen to this :-)

Anyway I've come to realise that I CAN plan tasks down to the last detail in my head. I can break it down into small baby steps BUT (and this is where I'm not sure GTD can help me) I fail time and time again to perform the step no matter how small.

Why is this? I've tried to ask myself is it because I'm afraid of what changes will have to happen to my life as a result of doing this. What is wrong with me that results in me doing something so small as replying to an email that does take less than two minutes to do?

I don't know. Is there anyone else out there that is similar?

Maybe the answers lie in the second half of the book and if they do I apologise.

Grateful for any help or reassurance that I don't need to go and see a shrink :o

JasonJ

Antemeridian's picture

I think I've located a...

mdl;8112 wrote:

I think I've located a few reasons for my procrastination:

1) Perfectionism and fear of failure. If I have a writing project, for instance, I will find all sorts of busywork related to the project in order to avoid the task of writing itself. This is because I am deathly afraid of seeing my own crappy first drafts. So I create the illusion that I'm busy, even when I could start the writing right away. This creates a temporary space of freedom--before having to expose my writing to the world. But it eventually blows up on me.

One thing I've been trying to make sure I'm concious of in this respect is something I read by Tony Buzan in The Ultimate Book of Mindmaps. Basically, its just a change in mental perspective, that look at each attempt as merely a way to learn something. Many people quote Edison in his invention of the lightbulb along this route. When he tried 1000 (can't remember the exact number but let's go with this) different materials for the filament in light bulbs, and still didn't find one that worked, instead of feeling that he failed 1000 times, he learned 1000 things that didn't work. It's much like the crappy first draft.

Essentially, the mental trick is that as long as you've learned something from each attempt/draft/revision/etc. then it isn't a failure, because you've made forward progress. In the same book mentioned above, there are a few other quotes by Einstein and others essentially saying the same thing.

Hope that helps,

Adam

 
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