The Radar of Regret and What to Do About It
First, a backstory to set the stage for the procrastination radar. So I’m 4 years old. Coat, gloves, and hat on. It’s early Spring and I’m wearing those ladybird wellies you could get from Woolies. Does anyone else have a pair of those? No? Just me then!
My Dad is in the garden with his cabbages and I’m helping…well…watching…ok, being a pain. I am 4! My Dad was moaning because there were holes in his cabbages, ‘Bloody Butterflies. Eating my flaming cabbages…’, and he would stop before the big words came out in front of a young ‘un. Instead of eating the whole cabbage, the cabbage butterfly would fly around taking nibbles from different cabbages. Nibble, nibble, butterfly looks up – ‘that looks tasty, I’ll have a nibble of that one’. <Repeat> <Repeat> <Repeat>. Then the butterfly leaves the patch and all the cabbages are full of holes because they didn’t just eat one but sampled them all. Little tinkers! But that’s not what Dad said.
Butterflies and Now Humans
Sadly, this is what we do at work. (Hint, the procrastination radar in us). Unfocused, yet very, very, very ‘busy’. Busy creating lots of holes (making light touches) and not doing the big stuff that makes the difference. We move from reading a PDF to seeing an email notification & reading the email, to instant messaging a colleague, to answering the phone, to ultimately running as fast as we can, yet doing the small and ignoring the big.
As the famous philosopher Pareto said, ’80:20′. We’re procrastinating on the 20% tasks that will deliver 80% of the difference because those tasks are big and tricky, and make us feel like we’re not getting as much done.
The Procrastination Radar is Responsible for Us Missing Out on So Much
We all have a procrastinating self. We don’t like that person. Because they do the little things when the big stuff should be done, and they do the big stuff when they are exhausted at the end of the day.
When that person has a big task to do, their procrastination radar pops up from the top of their head looking for anything else to do, so that they don’t have to do the task at hand. ‘Aha, Bob, we haven’t talked about health and safety in years. Let’s do it now’.
You know ‘that person’ inside our heads – the procrastinator, the operator of the procrastination radar – they are an expert in operating that radar. Dam them! So be aware of that radar operator because they are responsible for regrets like:
- ‘Sorry, I couldn’t get that project done on time. I was so busy’.
- ‘Yes, I’ll get to it next. I know it’s very important and worth a lot of money’.
- ‘What do you mean Bob got the promotion? I have worked my butt off here’.
You Can Beat the Procrastination Radar
Imagine focussing only 20 minutes per day and what you could achieve in a week.
We can focus for 20 minutes. Even proven research tells us this. The rest is up to you. You were born with a brain that can focus for 20 minutes, but it is you who accepts the distractions. So stop. Noe that the better your ability to focus the more productive and successful you will be. Scouts honour.
Just 20 minutes per day. That is all I am asking. Ignore everything else for 4% of the day. In this time you focus on making headway on the big stuff that you have been procrastinating on. Even a 20-minute dent every day for 5 days is 100 minutes. Imagine 1 hour and 40 minutes each week on the stuff you are not getting to that will really make an impact.
You could move mountains! So beat the procrastination radar today.
