The cycle of work-procrastination
This might seem rather familiar to you:
- Sit down to do Thing 1.
- [Thing 1 is annoying, boring, or intimidating.]
- “Oh look, a Completely Unrelated Thing!”
- [Obsessively work on Completely Unrelated Thing until you’re out of time.]
And, repeat as needed. But today I found myself doing something rather interesting! I procrastinated my top task by doing my next-most-important task.
This seems like something we could turn into a strategy…we can call it the Distraction Hierarchy.
The new cycle: the Distraction Hierarchy
We can spend a little time prioritizing tasks (or just listing them). If we do, we’ll know that (for example) the TPS reports are top priority, and the next couple of items on the list aren’t as bad, or are much quicker.
So the new cycle might look like:
- Sit down to do Thing 1.
- [Thing 1 is annoying, boring, or intimidating.]
- “I hate this. I’m going to work on Thing 2 or 3 on the list for a while!”
- [Work on and complete Thing 2 or Thing 3.]
- [Give self a high-five.]
- [Start on Thing 1 again later, or the next day.]
As I recently heard online, “Any progress is still better than none.”
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