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Procrastination is driven by our desire to avoid difficult emotions, says expert

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Re: Procrastination is driven by our desire to avoid difficult emotions, says expert

#111

Post by bloodorange »

Tenoke wrote: post #59
leadingthenet wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am exactly the same, though ADHD medication has helped tremendously in this respect. Terrible context switching, not lack of attention, is the bane of my existence. Have you ever had a test?

>Have you ever had a test? At university a councilor (or similar) said they believe I have ADHD but it was near the end of a school year so nothing came out of it. For what is worth, I've tried most common adhd meds on my own and while they definitely they also ruin my sleep so I am not convinced that going through the hassle of getting an official diagnosis will help all that much.

Have you considered going to someone who is qualified to diagnose the condition and prescribe medication?

Re: Procrastination is driven by our desire to avoid difficult emotions, says expert

#112

Post by PopeDotNinja »

Procrastination was been hitting me hard recently. I was so stressed out that I found myself literally saying "I'm not good enough." I knew that was not accurate, but I was still feeling inadequate. So I look a long lunch. While I was out I realized that I could pivot to saying "My code's not good enough" and "I am not my code". I was working through a lot, but I just wanted to share that it is possible to make incremental gains when you're feeling like krapola.

Re: Procrastination is driven by our desire to avoid difficult emotions, says expert

#113

Post by mbeex »

mihaaly wrote: post #99

To me it is also a conscious choice avoiding premature actions.

That is rational postponing, but both can be connected. Procrastination by definition has always something to do with negative feelings. But IMO not so much in the sense of the article. Only a few people care about future emotions, they may come or not. Real are only the ones in the present, characteristic for this trait. To unveil the underlying problem by lifting it up to its rational core might or might not help (not all are within yourself).

Re: Procrastination is driven by our desire to avoid difficult emotions, says expert

#114

Post by fizixer »

nisa wrote: post #73

Words of warning from a not so young (36) chronic procrastinator with a rather messed up life: Take it seriously. I'm not talking about reading HN in your 7th work hour when doing stupid Excel sheets. I'm talking about messing up years and years of your life. I believe it's a symptom of some deeper issues and it won't go away from alone. Lack of sleep, stress, work overload, information overload amplify the effects b…

Procrastination is a symptom and stuff like pomodoro is the band-aid.

Re: Procrastination is driven by our desire to avoid difficult emotions, says expert

#115

Post by ehnto »

javajosh wrote: post #36

Well, the difficult emotion is often some form of fear. Fear of failing, of making a mistake, in some cases, of making the problem worse. All of these fears are in a fundamental sense legitimate, but the direct solution is, insofar as it is possible, to prepare and practice. The alternative is to tackle something even harder that includes the thing you want to make as a special case. This is a recent discovery of min…

> The pressure of accomplishing the bigger, harder thing can often drive you to simply knock out the smaller thing to get it out of the way, and that's often good enough.

That's a really interesting observation, and I recently experienced it I think.

I am installing a new ECU in my car in order to tune it myself, something I'm really looking forward to but is honestly quite daunting and possibly expensive to fail at. The entire time the tuning has been on my mind, I've been learning and doing dozens of little things while installing the ECU. Things I'd normally be a bit worried about. Soldering, wiring, drilling and tapping. I've learned a bunch of new things along the way, none of them tuning. Now I'm at the point where I need to do the tuning and I'm so invigorated by the process of getting here that I feel much more prepared to do it.

Re: Procrastination is driven by our desire to avoid difficult emotions, says expert

#116

Post by octodog »

PopeDotNinja wrote: post #112

Procrastination was been hitting me hard recently. I was so stressed out that I found myself literally saying "I'm not good enough." I knew that was not accurate, but I was still feeling inadequate. So I look a long lunch. While I was out I realized that I could pivot to saying "My code's not good enough" and "I am not my code". I was working through a lot, but I just wanted to share that it is possible to make incre…

In a similar vein, when I start to feel like that I try to remind myself that I should be "questioning my knowledge, not my self".

I think it's quite a powerful idea. Questioning your knowledge can lead to positive introspection and growth, whereas questioning or doubting yourself will not.

Re: Procrastination is driven by our desire to avoid difficult emotions, says expert

#117

Post by bserge »

nisa wrote: post #73

Words of warning from a not so young (36) chronic procrastinator with a rather messed up life: Take it seriously. I'm not talking about reading HN in your 7th work hour when doing stupid Excel sheets. I'm talking about messing up years and years of your life. I believe it's a symptom of some deeper issues and it won't go away from alone. Lack of sleep, stress, work overload, information overload amplify the effects b…

I don't think it's about "avoiding difficult emotions" anymore. You'd think after years of procrastinating and as a result, getting even worse emotions, the brain would learn to not procrastinate in order to avoid unpleasant emotions.

Imo, it's a brain malfunction/illness. Some spectrum of ADD, some people being affected more than others. Perhaps it was useful in the millions of years of evolution, but it's counterproductive in a modern society.

Which is why I would love for (more) doctors to recognize procrastination/Attention Deficit as a real problem in itself and not just wave it away as a symptom of something else.

A real problem for which there is real, working medication, that thousands of people are happy with. But unfortunately due to the nature of these drugs, everyone shies away from it.

It's not the perfect solution, but it's a working solution. Medication would've changed my life, but I can not get it. And so I continue wasting hours, days, months and years of my life.

Not to mention it causes anxiety and depression, and they continue reinforcing each other, making things much worse.

Re: Procrastination is driven by our desire to avoid difficult emotions, says expert

#118

Post by bserge »

TrackerFF wrote: post #3

Just want to say that if someone here truly has tried to overcome procrastination, but still fails, try to get screened for ADD/ADHD. Even though it's a condition that is also quite over diagnosed, it's simultaneously a condition that's underdiagnosed IMO - it really depends on where you're looking / sampling. A lot of kids fly under the radar, because they don't show any obvious signs, even more so those with ADD /…

It also gets progressively worse, adult AD(spectrum) can be life ruining. I wish it was more recognized and I wish it was easier to get medication/treatment. The side effects are nothing compared to half a life wasted.

Re: Procrastination is driven by our desire to avoid difficult emotions, says expert

#119

Post by partyboat1586 »

battery423 wrote: post #107

Ritalin. Yepp went from a very bad grade to a very good grade. You can't tell me its about 'avoiding negative emotions' if i have prepared my learning desk with everything i need, cleaned it, etc. then i open the book and i literlay can't learn. That wall is much easier to break with ritalin. Is that shitty? Probably. Is it healthy? Probably not. But it brought me much further then before and i'm pretty sure that thr…

Ritalin suppresses some of those deeper emotions. It also gives you additional rewarding feelings for completing tasks here and now. Unless you have ADHD due to genetic factors then imo it's just a mask over the real emotional issue. A very effective and useful one but still a temporary measure.

Re: Procrastination is driven by our desire to avoid difficult emotions, says expert

#120

Post by PopeDotNinja »

octodog wrote: post #116
PopeDotNinja wrote: post #112

Procrastination was been hitting me hard recently. I was so stressed out that I found myself literally saying "I'm not good enough." I knew that was not accurate, but I was still feeling inadequate. So I look a long lunch. While I was out I realized that I could pivot to saying "My code's not good enough" and "I am not my code". I was working through a lot, but I just wanted to share that it is possible to make incre…

In a similar vein, when I start to feel like that I try to remind myself that I should be "questioning my knowledge, not my self". I think it's quite a powerful idea. Questioning your knowledge can lead to positive introspection and growth, whereas questioning or doubting yourself will not.

Yeah, When I reached "my code's not good enough", I started to come up with some actionable steps to take to resolve that.
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