Confessions of a procrastinator

I was going to tweet this one little confession on Twitter.

I cajoled my husband into buying a lovely old piano when we first moved into our new house, which he did on the proviso that I learn to play.  Of course I would learn, I said.  That’s the whole idea of buying one.  Why have a piano if you can’t play it.

That was 10 years ago, and I, er, still haven’t learnt to play it.

OK, so that was the confession I was going to make.  But then I started thinking of all the other things I was “gunna” do.  They make a somewhat shameful list:

• Finish three patchwork quilts I have in varying stages of not-yet-finishedness.
• Get frames for the myriad of photos I have lying around and stylishly decorate our home with them.
• Learn French.
• Post here three times a week…

I won’t bore you with the complete list.  Needless to say, there are quite a few other things I could add.

Procrastination annoys the bejeezus out of me.  I’ve read a great pile of books about overcoming it.  I’ve visited the websites.  I know how to overcome it.  It feels great to get something done, even a small part of a task. Why don’t I just do it?

My major problem, I think at least, is that I overthink everything.  I’ve written about that before in my Productivity for Mums series.  The other thing is, if I’m realistic, there might be a few too many things on my list.  I’m probably not going to be able to do all the things I’ve listed above at the same time, certainly not while managing a family and home.

So what is the answer…

Go back to basics.  Break things up into smaller, achievable tasks.  Create a list and just do the stuff on it without complicating what is not complicated.  I’m also going to get back to focusing on my goals here (oh gosh, was my August review really the last one I did?), which I’ve let slide in favour of other things I’ve been working on.

Do you sometimes feel like you just need to stop what you’re doing and go back to basics?  Regroup?  How do you go about it?

Tags: procrastination, productivity