Procrastination will always been a difficult obstacle to overcome whether you’re a student, a working adult, a parent, or just a plain bum.

Procrastination is next to human nature to some, which typically manifests as behavior that deferments any action, important or mundane to a later time. Filipinos have a special name to this attitude, the Manana Habit.

Procrastination hurts

To the procrastinator, he or she may think that by putting things off until he’s in the “mood” to do them is a good thing because he’ll be able to have the motivation to work. In reality however, he or she is not only losing time to do his work but loosing the opportunity to do work.

Confusing? Not really.

Just think about it. While waiting for the opportunity to get motivated to come, there’s always the chance that it may not come at all which puts the procastinator in the position of cramming to the last second till the deadline. I’ll conceed that many people do work well under pressure but sometimes taking the risk of putting things off can be too great. You either end up with a sloppy, last-minute work or end up not finishing at all.

Why do we do it?

One of the key reasons that people procrastinate is that they fall into the trap of making emotional decisions instead of logical decisions. It’s almost always “I can do this later so for now I’ll” or “I’m too bored to do this now, I’ll do it later.”

The decision to do task is based on what will make the procrastinator feel good for the moment. It’s just like nibbling down a bag of chips because, even though you know it is unhealthy, you know it will taste good and give you a moment’s satisfaction.

A prudent person will choose a logical decision, choosing to do “what needs to be done” with little or no regard whatsoever for what makes him or her happy. But only a few people can pull this off. The temptation to procastinate is usually too hard to overcome. I know. I’ve been there.

What to do?

Letting our emotions rule our life is always a double edged sword. While it will give us some sense of having our personal touch on everything we do, it also risks the chance of getting hurt and avoidance, in this case procrastination.

Procrastination is childish, irresponsible, and stupid.

Here are 4 tips on how to stop procrastinating:

Act Immediately

Note that you shouldn’t act IMPULSIVELY. Just act the moment you get things figured out, right before anything else bothers you. Most people stop midway or don’t even begin because they are too occupied thinking about irrelevant and distracting thoughts.Stop just talking about the problem, stop thinking about the problem in your head, just start doing it.

Save the excuses

Excuses are a defense mechanism for falling short. The excuses you tell and come up with the more that it’ll stick and drag you down. You are what you think you are. If think that something is too difficult – then your body will think you’re pushing yourself.

Think you are

Overconfidence is a flaw but doing it right can be helpful. Believing in yourself and what you can do will make a lot of things so much easier.If you approached your work as if everything was possible and removed any doubts that you may have, you would achieve a lot more.Just don’t over do it. There’s a fine line between self-confidence and over-confidence..

Focus on being productive

What uses up most of you time? Emails? Chats? Blogposts (ouch!)? Are you doing what you want to do first, second, and third based on what feels good or what you are supposed to be doing?Stop procrastinating by doing what’s easy and non-productive and instead focus on the important stuff first. You can also do your leisure later.

Umm.. You’ll note that I’ve added an Avatar (Haruhi of Ouran) to the post. It won’t be a regular thing except for this category of posts (since someone might flag me as a Dosh Dosh wannabe) since it’s a sort of habit on my personal blogs.