NAME YOUR MONKEY DEALING WITH PROCRASTINATION

NAME YOUR MONKEY

Dealing with procrastination

Words by Rachel Zammit Cutajar

I can do it tomorrow. It’s not that urgent. I’m going to be terrible at it. I don’t think I can do it. What do you tell yourself when you’re putting something off for tomorrow? Procrastination is something that affects everyone. But is it a question of laziness, or is it something more manageable? Cognitive Behavioural Coach, Jonathan Shaw, has in the past has helped people deal with procrastination among productivity killers.

Researchers suggest that procrastination can be particularly pronounced among students. A 2007 meta-analysis published in the Psychological Bulletin found that a whopping 80% to 95% of college students procrastinated on a regular basis. Anyone who has completed a university degree has experienced some form of extreme procrastination, pulling an all-nighter, or two, close to the dissertation deadline. Whether they had six months to write it, or just three, the bulk of the work seems to occur pretty much around the deadline. Life doesn’t seem to improve much after that, with much work being put off until deadlines loom.

Procrastination isn’t a unique character flaw or a mysterious curse on your ability to manage time, but a way of coping with challenging emotions and negative moods induced by certain tasks — boredom, anxiety, insecurity, frustration, resentment, self-doubt and beyond. 25% of adults admit to chronic procrastination being a defining characteristic of their personality.

Jonathan Shaw, CEO of local supermarket group Wellbee’s, is trained in Cognitive Behavioural Coaching. Defined as a corporate and personal coaching technique used to enable those restricted by emotional or psychological barriers to reach their goals, Jonathan was immediately drawn into this approach when he read an article about it, and realised that this was something he could benefit from. Rather than finding a practitioner, he decided to get qualified with the International Association of Cognitive Behaviour in London, and coached others to deal with similar situations.

According to a data collection website, in the workplace, 80% of employees earn a salary, while 76% of entrepreneurs spend one to four hours procrastinating on any given day. Procrastinating for 3 hours per day costs businesses €15,000 annually for a €40,000 salaried worker.

“The way we think determines the way we feel, act and behave. You need to first understand the way you're processing things before you can address the situation itself. You need to identify thinking pitfalls, and discover the disturbances that are holding you back, before tackling the issues at hand.”

“It’s not a question of discovering what needs to be done. People know what they need to do. What they need to process is what is holding them back from doing it. During a coaching session, it's the coachee that comes up with the solutions to the problem. As a coach, I will never suggest a solution, but guide the coachee towards coming up with options, and then choosing the one with the optimal outcome. There is no one-size-fits-all with cognitive behavioural coaching. What works for one person won’t necessarily work for someone else. This is a technique that CEOs can also use in leading their management teams.”

Between the ages of eight and ten, humans develop the skill to self-talk - that inner voice that combines conscious thoughts with inbuilt beliefs and biases to create an internal monologue throughout the day. Jonathan says that we confuse this self-talk with thinking. However, the things we create in our head are not always real. “How often do you worry about something that never materialises? For example, if you're giving a presentation and see people looking at their phone, your inner voice might tell you that the presentation is boring, but what if the're texting a friend to say how incredible this presentation is?”

The particular nature of our aversion depends on the given task or situation. It may be due to something inherently unpleasant about the task itself — having to clean a dirty bathroom or organising a long, boring spreadsheet. But it might also result from deeper feelings related to the task, such as selfdoubt, low self-esteem, anxiety, or insecurity. Staring at a blank document, you might be thinking, 'I'm not smart enough to write this. Even if I am, what will people think of it? Writing is so hard. What if I do a bad job? Jonathan compares this voice to a monkey. “Everyone has their own monkey. Over the years the monkey grows and learns from experience. He’s not always the same; sometimes he’s aggressive, sometimes he’s calm; sometimes he’s helpful, encouraging you at the start of a race, for example. But the monkey can also derail you, telling you things that aren’t real… you’re not good enough, you don’t have enough time to finish this project, you can do this tomorrow, it’s not that urgent.”

Jonathan advocates that the best way to tame the monkey is to first give it a name and then start to question the things the monkey says. “There are three questions you should ask when the monkey strikes. What’s the proof? Is it logical? Is this thinking helping me? This will allow you to make sense of the situation and decide whether the things that are worrying you are real or just something created in your head.”

Then the magic question is, what is the worst-case scenario? Cognitive Behavioural Coaching is not about positive thinking. There are plenty of real-life situations where positive thinking can be detrimental. A freelance worker may be worried about not having enough clients. Adopting a passive positive attitude where one assumes that everything will eventually work itself out may not result in the effort required to secure more paying clients. Cognitive Behavioural Coaching teaches you to worry effectively, and to come up with options that will provide an acceptable outcome.

Though developing a healthy relationship with your monkey may be the beginning to battling procrastination, it's not the only tool. Jonathan hails structure and planning as his biggest weapon. “I spend the first 10 minutes of the day writing things down. I developed my own notepad with a number of lists – priorities for the day, meetings, calls that need to be made, reminders and a To Do list are all on one page so that everything seems manageable. If things get messy as the day goes by, I start over – a fresh page gives me a fresh outlook.”

“Blocking off space to get a job done is also important. Meetings can be a waste of time, resulting in a day where you seem to have got nothing done. So, block off days with no meetings in order to work on the things that are important. Time the meetings you need to take according to your own energy levels. If you work well in the mornings and experience a bit of a slump in the afternoon, be sure to schedule the things that need most attention in the morning and save the afternoons for less intense work or meetings that may not turn out to be productive.”

While these simple structures may help a person become more productive and waste less time, a one-glove-fits-all approach simply does not work. A variety of different methods may have to be tried before one that works comes your way. While personalised coaching is the way to go if your budget allows for it, there are plenty of free resources online that will help you organise your thoughts and activities throughout the day.

Procrastination can have debilitating effects on a person’s mental health, social, professional, and financial well-being. Start today by giving your monkey a name and making friends with him. Start to tame the beast inside your head.