For most of human civilization, procrastination advice has come from so-called experts, parents, relative,s and friends.
If you were smart, you would learn from one or two of the richest, most successful people you knew who doesn’t procrastinate. But even then, your advice was based on just a couple data sources and you couldn’t really be sure if it was the most accurate advice.
When you get advice from someone who is mediocre at what they’re giving advice on, it’s no surprise you get mediocre results.
Nowadays, we have access to hundreds of resources, interviews, and content from successful people. But even then, it may not be the best advice for you. That advice may have worked for them, but it may be different for you because you have your own unique challenges, strengths, weaknesses, and talent. You’re an average guy, like me, not a genetic genius, like them.
But now, we have a third valuable resource to turn to…
Science.
Today, I want to share with you a new scientific study done that reveals a secret to stop procrastinating:
The study was done by Wohl, Pychyl, and Bennett on 119 university students. The students completed measures of procrastination and self-forgiveness before two mid-terms. The study found that the students who had high levels of forgiveness for procrastinating on studying reduced their procrastination on the second mid-term. This was because they had reduced levels of negative emotion and increased self-image because they forgave themselves more.
Forgiving yourself is also something that the successful actor, Terry Crews, mentioned in his YouTube video as a secret to success for improving your willpower.
Maybe you’ve heard the advice to forgive yourself before. Maybe you have the urge to call this generic advice. But you’ve probably been given dozens of tips on defeating procrastination already. And it didn’t work. Perhaps, you don’t know what to trust anymore. But now, you know that forgiveness works since you have evidence.
Is this experiment iron-clad? Not exactly. I think the sample size tested was small. There is no mention of a control group. Having said that, the budget necessary to get a larger sample size is difficult. I think this is a great sign that forgiveness is important.
From a common sense standpoint, I can see how beating yourself up for doing something wrong, like procrastinating, can cause you to have a negative self-image and thoughts that can sabotage you in your future.
I’m the king of dwelling on negative thoughts, comparing myself to others, and beating myself up in my head. I used to do it very often when I was a pre-med in college and I had dozens of pages of boring scientific literature I was assigned to read through every night.
I mistakenly took on all the blame and responsibility and pointed to myself as a failure when in reality, I just wasn’t passionate or interested in the material and I needed to be okay with that. I had to realize that there were many different pathways to wealth and that there are other, more enjoyable ways to get rich.
I was too tough on myself and that definitely affected my self-esteem and image, which likely had rippling effects to other areas of my life, like dating.
For the Asian American crowd especially, our culture pushes us to sometimes look at ourselves as a failure or make ourselves believe that we are screwed or useless disappointments to our parents if we don’t have a certain genetic gift or ability to meet academic expectations.
It took me years of studying actual successful people to realize that this perspective is toxic and wrong.
It’s hard to fathom since our parents are seen as people who can’t do any wrong growing up — but in reality, they’re immigrants who worked hard and got from low-class to maybe even upper-middle-class but still have a lot to learn about parenting and being successful from billionaires, scientists, and others.
More importantly, procrastination can be a blessing-in-disguise.
It’s not always bad. It can be a sign that you’re not doing something you’re passionate about. It can help you identify a moment in your life to pivot to a career that is more enjoyable and profitable than you would have otherwise had.
Ask yourself why you are procrastinating. Why do you even want to finish this task in the first place?
If you are forced to finish an essay for school to graduate parents told you that you have to be a doctor even though you hate everything about being a doctor, that’s a bad sign.
The billionaire, Sara Blakely, for instance, failed the LSATs twice. It was probably the best thing to happen to her. In the short run, it didn’t seem so because she worked as one of the people who dress up as characters at Disney World and then as a door-to-door salesman. But now, she’s become a wealthy entrepreneur who loves what she does.
Hope this helps — wishing you tons of love — take this advice and run with it. I want to see you unleash the potential inside of you.
-Will
