Procrastination is something everyone does on occasion (some of us more than others). In fact, I even procrastinated a little on writing this story – ironic, I know. But, in the end, this story did eventually get done because you’re reading it right now! So here I present to you: 10 Ways to Battle Your Procrastination! This list isn’t in any specific order, but all of these strategies will help to improve your productivity.

1.Put Your Phone Away

This can be through silencing your phone, shutting it off, or putting it in another room. Although it can be challenging for our generation to put down their phones, doing this really helps improve concentration by removing distractions. Giving yourself a dedicated time period to have your phone away while you work can help prevent you from getting distracted and going back to your phone.

 2. Make Yourself A Schedule

Introducing a routine into your daily life can help improve efficiency and help get more done. Something as simple as planning when to get certain tasks done can go a long way. By making a schedule to accommodate your work and personal needs, you can make sure everything that needs to get done is completed in a timely manner. 

3. Give Yourself Breaks

Taking breaks might sound contradictory because why take breaks when you’re trying to get stuff done? However, allowing yourself to take reasonable short breaks gives your brain time to unwind and de-stress. This can prevent burnout, which is yet another important factor in improving productivity. Short breaks shouldn’t be an excuse to run away from tasks, but instead, brief time slots between tasks. Breaks can also prevent taking longer to accomplish trivial goals. 

4. Take Care of Yourself First

This strategy is similar to the previous one. It’s important to get your own needs out of the way so you can focus on your tasks at hand. Taking care of yourself can be through eating a proper meal, drinking water, self-care, or cleaning up your environment. Through getting these small chores done, you are already improving your productivity, and allowing for yourself to put in better effort to other tasks. 

5. Switch Up Your Environment 

Sometimes, going to another room that you don’t usually do your work at – or if you’re, for example studying, going to a different place such as the library or even sitting outside – can boost your productivity. Changing your surroundings can stimulate your brain and help you perform better and feel more motivated to finish whatever project you’ve been working on. 

6. Split Up Large Workloads

Although it might sound obvious, don’t wait to start or finish a task. Even if it’s that one assignment or one chore you’ve been dreading to do, don’t wait until the last minute to finish it. Instead, to make a daunting workload seem doable, break up your workload into smaller manageable portions. This can promote efficiency in your work even when you don’t feel like starting. 

7. Change Your Mindset

Another way to boost your productivity is as simple as changing your mindset. Thinking positively and hyping yourself up to accomplish tedious tasks can be a good push in the right direction. Furthermore,  you’re not likely to get very far without putting an intention to get stuff done in your mind. Telling yourself that you will eventually get a chore done isn’t going to cut it for you, but, putting yourself in the right mindset to start said chore will. 

8. Make Goals

Setting realistic and reasonable goals for yourself can help you maintain your progress and keep your motivation. One big part of procrastination is lack of motivation, but setting goals for yourself can combat this issue. Small specific goals that can measure your progress, such as SMART goals, can bring an orderly fashion to your workload and help maintain motivation.

9. Don’t Dwell on Details

One way to improve efficiency is through letting go of the need for perfection and just starting and finishing a task. Many people fall victim to their need for perfection, and end up spending too much time focusing on perfecting the details which leads to more time being spent and less work getting done. So if you feel stuck in your work, maybe the best thing to do to help yourself is to move on instead of trying to fix the smaller details. 

10. Reward Yourself

If you still feel a lack of motivation, one effective way to return it is through incentives. Rewarding yourself for doing small tasks can help you regain enthusiasm to continue getting more tasks done and also stimulates the brain into associating positive things with finishing a task.