

I wrote this essay on procrastination as a way of not completing another task. - RyanMcGreal
http://quandyfactory.com/blog/1/productivity_and_procrastination

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nopassrecover
Nice read. These may be of interest to people as well:
[http://www.stevepavlina.com/articles/overcoming-
procrastinat...](http://www.stevepavlina.com/articles/overcoming-
procrastination.htm) [http://www.stevepavlina.com/blog/2006/03/conscious-
procrasti...](http://www.stevepavlina.com/blog/2006/03/conscious-
procrastination/)

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RyanMcGreal
Interesting read. There's some great advice in there - especially his take on
the importance of play - but much of it reads like the standard approach to
procrastination that has consistently failed to work for me. For example:

> Sometimes you may have more items on your to-do list than you can reasonably
> complete. This can quickly lead to overwhelm, and ironically you may be more
> likely to procrastinate when you can least afford it. Think of it as your
> brain refusing to cooperate with a schedule that you know is unreasonable.
> In this case the message is that you need to stop, reassess your true
> priorities, and simplify.

My experience is exactly the opposite - the only time I'm really productive is
when I have way too much to do. In fact, when the density of my agenda drops
below a critical threshold of overwhelm, my productivity collapses to zero.

His section on laziness is a bit more ambiguous. I agree that exercise is a
great way of jump-starting an inert brain (I commute by bicycle and generally
take a brisk walk every day after lunch), but disagree that laziness as such
is necessarily a problem.

Again, in my experience laziness has been a strong and persistent incentive
for me to figure out how to accomplish more with less work - i.e. increase my
productivity.

Similarly, his section on lack of motivation rings hollow for me. I
chronically lack the motivation to do whatever is the most important thing I
should be doing; but instead of fighting against it, I've learned to leverage
my work avoidance by doing _other_ productive work as a way of not doing what
I'm supposed to be working on.

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thetrumanshow
> In fact, when the density of my agenda drops below a critical threshold of
> overwhelm, my productivity collapses to zero.

I agree.

However, when I worked at a major DoD contractor for my first job, I was able
to be productive even when there was 0 overwhelm. It was only after I worked
at a pressure-cooker company that I became completely dependent on having lots
of work and little time in order to be productive.

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messel
Fantastic take on procrastination and how we may organize our schedule to
manipulate ourselves into getting more done.

Cognitive biases are something I'm worried about, because by definition
they're something I can't recognize (I blogged about it a short time ago).
Procrastination is a form of trick our mind plays on us, funny how we can turn
the table.

Take that Mind!

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jamesbritt
ObVid: <http://cdn-www.i-am-bored.com/media/1450_procrastination.mov>

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DavidMcLaughlin
First paragraph seemed good, I'll read the rest later.

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messel
It's worth finishing (great excerpts from Paul Graham and John Perry)

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onreact-com
I wrote this comment while not working on my projects.

Basically I made a career out of the stuff I do while not working on my
projects. I did SEO for a while but I preferred to do blogging and social
media in the meantime and now I do far more of it officially.

