Eylül 's Key Ideas from Solving the Procrastination Puzzle
by Timothy A. Pychyl

• Believe in change wholeheartedly.
• Determine your attitudes that are suitable for your procrastination list.
• Note how these procrastinations affect your life (mental and physical health, economic situation, social relations, etc.). 
• After we become aware of our procrastination behaviors, we must become aware of the benefits of “taking action”. Even thinking about the effects of short-term and medium-term objectives on our lives is an important step. 

• We shouldn't gravitate toward feeling good. We procrastinate a task because we think it is difficult and pusher and so we tend to do other things making us feel better. In this situation, we need to remain still and be aware of our negative feelings at that moment. 
• We believe that to do something, we must be in the mood for it. However, waiting for motivation is wrong for taking an action. 

     “When you start to take action towards your purpose,

     you will see that your attitude and motivation will change” 

• We need to determine the excuses and lies that we tell ourselves. For example, if you often appeal something like “I have so many times for this task, I can do it later”, then flag it. Thus, you can be aware of the attitude of procrastination when you say this sentence and you can pave the way for a different reaction. 

• When we get a clue about procrastination, start the task immediately. Most of us concentrate on “completion” rather than “beginning”. So the task we have to do becomes exaggerated. 
• To start immediately, make the task simple and concrete. Additionally, determine implementation targets that reveal when, where, and how you will achieve a certain goal. This makes you progress determinedly on the related task. 

     “The journey of a thousand miles begins with one step”

• When the subject is procrastination, the beginning is not enough. When we are working on our task, things may occur that will cause deviation from the target. To get these things under control, you can do two things:

          - To identify from the beginning what distracts you. For instance, you may close your mobile phone. 

          - To set implementation targets for distractions that you cannot determine from the beginning.Ex: For friends who might invite you to meet up, you can prepare an answer like “I am happy with your invitation but I need to finish my job”     

• Will is scarce so our motivation might decline when we use our self-regulation capacity to the fullest. In this situation, to recover and continue you can use the following strategies:

     -The will is like a muscle. You can develop your self-regulation ability through exercise.

     -Sleep and rest are very important in refreshing self-regulation skills.

     -Self-regulation becomes harder towards the end of the day. Do not rely on your strong will at the end of the day.

     -Positive feelings are also important for self-regulation. Find things/people that make you feel good.

• Some personal characteristics are effective in procrastination behavior. For instance, one of these characteristics is perfectionism. Perfectionist people may procrastinate because of their thoughts that they cannot satisfy others -family, boss, workmates, society, etc.

You need to challenge your worries or anxieties. You cannot change your characteristics in one night but you can self-regulate some measure. You can change your behaviors in the short term and your personal characteristics in the long term.

Ask yourself what can happen if you try and be unsuccessful.

Determine implementation targets and be proactive and precondition yourself to show different behaviors.  

• While you are working on your target/task, restrain distractions. Because the internet and social media give us a sense of satisfaction in an instant, they lead us to be unsuccessful on the way of our targets. Thus, close all the programs other than you need for your work. 

The process of making changes in our attitudes and behaviors is complicated. One day we can feel as we are making great progress but the other day think that we turn back to the beginning.

When you feel that you cannot make any progress, have a soft spot for yourself and have a go at it firmly. Don’t forget that it is very difficult to change rooted behavior with the new ones. Thus, we have to make an effort consciously on new behaviors to make them a part of our daily life routine.