Bloganuary: What are the pros and cons of procrastination?
Poor procrastination. It gets such a bad rap. Blame the productivity/industrial complex for this (h/t Becca Syme).
One thing I like to remember is that procrastination is simply trying to tell you something (and that something isn’t that you’re lazy).
It’s unearthing what it’s trying to tell you. That’s the tricky part.
Can’t write? Maybe you need to ponder the story a bit more. Or maybe it’s tax season, and you need to clear the decks and finish your taxes. Maybe you’re procrastinating at work because there’s a problem elsewhere in your life.
Maybe you’re approaching burnout and really, really need to take a break.
How to tell? One trick I use is the Pomodoro technique. I set a timer for 25 minutes, focus on the thing I’ve been trying to do (but procrastinating), and see what happens. At the end of those twenty-five minutes, I’ll know whether I was wrestling with garden-variety resistance or if there’s a larger issue at hand.
Writing Wrongs 
Focus? On anything? This sounds like a useful technique, but I might need to meet it half-way –e.g., at 10 minutes at a time (with 2-minute breaks) — and built up from there…
That’s a great trick! I’m going to try that next time I’m procrastinating.