Healthy Procrastination

Like everyone, there are some things I don’t wait to do because I’m excited to do them, either because they’re important or they’re interesting enough not to wait on.

Also like everyone, there are things that I wait till the last minute to do. I used to think procrastination was unhealthy, but I’m noticing that there are times when procrastinating something leads to avoiding being drained by the guilt of not doing it, and getting the thing done in the least time possible.

My vice for procrastination is anything related to paperwork. My current struggle is attaching a photo of our physical marriage certificate as the last bit of paperwork for our notary so we can sell our condo in Montreal.

When I wake up in the morning, and I’m full of energy and ideas, ready to do my hardest, most challenging (and therefore gratifying) work, I can’t have any obstacles in my way. The last thing I want to be thinking about is the marriage certificate in the drawer in my daughter’s bedroom I have to go dig up and then attach to an email. That’s a sure-fire way to knock me out of whatever writing flow or deep thinking in prep for a coaching session I’m in.

Instead, I procrastinate the admin task until it gets so close to the deadline that enough pressure is created to motivate me to finally complete it.

I’ve noticed that I do one very important thing subtly: I grant myself permission not to worry about the task until it is truly due. I move on, guilt-free, no longer having this pesky admin task hovering in the back of my mind for countless days or weeks.

I let my mind let go of the low-leverage activity so it can be liberated to pursue the high-leverage activities it’s excited to tackle.

Healthy procrastination of unexciting, low-leverage tasks has been a reliable way to unobstruct my mind so that it can do what it wants to do and what it does best: work of the soul.