Procrastination is a state of mind that’s a bit like the twilight zone.  It’s a behaviour we all know, to some extent.  I found this clip today and, sad to say, it is something I TOTALLY understand!  Ah, stuff!  And getting it done!  If you’re a procrastinator, you probably looked at the clip and thought - “That’s really funny”.  But why is it funny?  Let me tell you - it’s funny because you understand it, because you’ve been there, and because - if you’re watching the clip - then you are watching the animation instead of “getting stuff done”!

 

We all drag any number of things and actions (always useful and essential things and action, I want to stress) into our day, in place of getting done the things we had actually set out to do in the first place.  We have the clean desk, the anti-bac wiped phone and keyboard, the re-sharpened pencils in their holder, the felt tips all tested and the old ones binned … need I go on?  You probably have your own favourite.

 

For me, as a parent, I can always find a “family” reason why I didn’t get my blog post written.  I had to collect my daughter from the station, I had to drop my son to guitar class, I had to shop for the dinner etc.  These are all blessed with the special category of “family”, therefore I cannot be blamed for doing them before writing my blog.

 

What’s really going on here?  Yep, I’m trying to justify NOT doing something I’ve already committed to doing.  Beyond that, what’s the story?  Well - is the thing I’m avoiding necessary?  To whom?  In what way?  To whose benefit?  One possibility is that it’s not something I really want to do at all.  If that’s the case, why am I doing/avoiding it?  Does it comply with my role in some way? (e.g. is it so I’ll be seen as a good/better businesswoman/coach/worker or - dare I say it - person)?  Maybe it’s not something I need to be doing at all.

 

Or is it something I want to do, in order to have it done, but don’t enjoy the doing of it?  What can I do?  Maybe I can delegate?  Maybe I can do turn-and-turn-about with a colleague/neighbour?  Maybe I can offer to exchange my skill in some other area, with someone who has skills in my area of procrastination?

 

Finally, it may be something I want to do, I need to do it and, in the circumstances, I’m the only one who can do it.  At this point, the easiest path is acceptance.  “Ok, I have to do this.  I don’t enjoy it, but I will enjoy the benefits of having it done.  So - as Brian Tracy might say - “Eat that Frog!”  Just bite the bullet and do it.  Pick the nastiest, most put-off job and start with that.  You will feel such a sense of satisfaction and - yes - self-righteous pride when you have it done, that it will make you look forward to the next challenge with more enthusiasm and less procrastination than you have before.

 

Now I have a frog called “ironing” that I have to go and eat!

 

 

Here’s a start:

I think you get the idea.  Maybe none of these is your particular favourite, but I know there are easy, inexpensive treats we can all avail of, if we put our minds to it.  One of mine is playing “Risk” with the family (it’s a board game based on world domination!) great for unleashing hidden megalomaniac in all of us!

 

When you have your list made, start putting them into practice, and have fun!

 

Let me know what you’re favourites are.  I’ll put some in next month’s newsletter.

 

Have you heard about Earth Hour?  Are you going to participate?  Watch this and find out what’s happening in your neighbourhood for Earth Hour.  It’s a chance to show our solidarity and commitment to making the planet a better place to live.

 

 

If you live here in Ireland check out www.change.ie .  Or to find out details of worldwide action, take a look at www.earthhour.org .  See what we can do to help our family, our community and our planet.

 

I know a lot of women who are going crazy.  You might say “It takes one to know one”.  And, on this occasion, I would definitely have to agree.  Y’see I’m meeting a lot of women whose families are grown, or in college, or gaining their independence day by day.  I’m seeing women who are in a position to evaluate where they are in their lives.

 

That sounds very positive, doesn’t it?  But on the ground, in the ordinary everyday-ness of life, what it really amounts to is a sense of bewilderment.  Now, don’t get me wrong.  This is not all women, and not all of the time.  But there is definitely a huge readjustment to be done when the job you’ve been doing for the past twenty years or so is suddenly surplus to requirements!  It would be very easy for me to say “Blah Blah Blah Challenge”; “Blah Blah Opportunity”, but that’s not going to help you deal with it, or even accept it.

 

That brings me to the first important thing - you’ve got to accept it.  Acknowledge that it is happening.  It is valid.  You have spent a huge chunk of your life giving your time, energy, genius, nourishment, caring and love to other people.  Now - if you’ve done your job well, they need your time (but never your love) less.  You haven’t suddenly become useless.  You just need to take time to take stock of your life.  It’s one of those big, life-changing-direction type of phases.  Sometimes it feels like being a teenager again, except that in mid-life, you feel you should know better!

 

Marianne Williamson (in her book “The Age of Miracles”) refers to “personal excavation” at this time, to release the baggage of the past and create the life you want for the future. 

 

Don’t mind that this video clip is a promo for her book.  Ignore that - she still has some interesting things to say about this time of life.

 

 

 

What can you begin to do about it?  Benefit from it?  Make it a useful phase from which to grow? 

 

My suggestion is to admit it to yourself.  Admit to it with those you love.  Tell it like it is.  “I’m finding that, having done my job as well as I could for years, I’m not sure what my job is anymore.  I’m feeling confused about my role, sometimes insecure about my future, and it can be frightening.  I really need you to try to understand and support me while I make adjustments in my life.  I need your patience and your love, because -just as beginning the journey of commitment and family was a big, important step for me in the past - this step of commitment to myself and my future is important too.”

 

Now give yourself time to be in this space of change.  Deepak Chopra talks about the “Wisdom of Uncertainty” and I can understand what he means.  But often, it scares the crap out of me!  So - just because I’m suggesting you give yourself space to be uncertain, I’m not saying it will be easy.  I understand what it’s like.  Let’s go for it!

 

I was doing an exercise recently, in fact I’m still working on it, about motivation.  The exercise was to determine what motivates me.  I wracked my brain.  I asked myself deep, searching questions.  The only thing I could come up with was - that when my family is in a crisis of any sort, small or large, I am motivated like never before.  My focus becomes clear.  My focus is razor sharp.  My senses are like that of an animal hunting, or being hunted.  Everything to left and right fades away and only my path becomes clear, focused and definite.

 

 

But the exercise required me to mention 5 ways/things that motivate me.  I could not think of any others.  I did the exercise with a colleague.  Still nothing.  I was beginning to feel that it was odd that only a negative thing would motivate me so energetically.  So I e-mailed a couple of people to ask them what questions I could ask myself to elicit the answers.  They both replied in much the same way.  They pointed out that I was motivated every day, I just didn’t think about it.  Why would I get out of bed in the morning if I wasn’t motivated?  Why would I have tried to do the exercise in the first place, if I wasn’t motivated?  Why would I eat, read, learn, feed my family & care for them, drive my kids to their classes etc. if I wasn’t motivated?

 

So I began to see that I was looking for a huge motivating factor.  I was looking for what motivates me to make big decisions, or big changes, or take big chances.  But, while these occasions for the BIG motivator and BIG response do exist, they are not the nuts and bolts of my everyday living.  My ordinary (if any motivator is truly ordinary) motivations are the same as the big one I identified - I love my family.  I want to be loved, needed, appreciated, listened to.  I want to feel good.  That motivates me to do the things that will lead to me feeling good.  End of story.

 

I don’t mean “I need a new haircut” or “I need a holiday in Spain”.  I mean your real needs, the things that are crucial to your living a full live.  I’m talking about “I need to feel loved.  I need to be heard.  I need to pass on, to someone else, the love and joy that I feel”.  Because when you find those real, deep-down needs that you must fulfill to have a happy life, they are also the clues to the beliefs that are “hardwired” into your earliest programming. 

 

You  might say that “survival” is the most basic need, because if we don’t survive then there’s no point in worrying about the other stuff!  But straight after survival come the needs that we have that, if they are not met (either by ourselves or by others), we will have a mere survival, and not a life.  What do you want for yourself?  Just to survive?  Or to really live?

 

I have always known that family is very important to me.  As a member of a family of seven (one sister, three brothers & the parents), the actions and interactions of “family” is what supports me, challenges me, drives me and sometimes limits me (depending on what I choose).  But when I started learning about NLP and how our own internal programming and view or “map” of the world affects us, I dug down to the very core of my beliefs.  And right there, at the heart, is the fact that - for me - family is sacred.  Way beyond what is nice and cosy, snuggled up by the fire, heart-to-heart chats with family members.  It is like my “Prime Directive” (for all Star Trek fans), and my decisions and actions all stem from that.  The basis for it was built up in my earliest years, through experiences and understandings that I had as a child.

 

But is it always useful for me, now, as an adult with family of my own?  Is it helpful for me to hold sacred a system which may need to change and adapt over the years?  This is a rhetorical question, by the way.  While I myself will always be searching for the answer to this, and acting on it, it is only relevant to you in terms of what your Prime Directive is, where it came from, and whether it still supports you.

 

After survival comes belief.  Choose carefully what you believe, and keep checking to see if it supports you throughout your life, in all and changing circumstances.  Remember you get to choose.

 

You know what? I’ve been avoiding mentioning “goals”, “resolutions”, “targets” etc. since the start of the year, because they don’t relate to only the start of theyear. And anyway, the “start of the year” is just a question of how you count time in days, months and years. Throughout history people have altered the way we count time. Even this year we had a “leap second” at New Year, in order to keep our clocks in line with the orbit of the earth. It’s not an exact science and every now and then we need to make adjustments. So - just because New Year currently falls between months called December and January - it’s just the current state of affairs. It might change again. Who knows?

 

Standard New Year has never meant a lot to me in terms of looking back and looking forward. I can do that any day I choose. When I was a kid, I used to love hearing the foghorns from the boats in Dublin Bay, sounding to each other to ring in the new year, but that was the most special thing about that particular midnight. When I was older I used to enjoy going to a party that a friend held every new year’s eve in his family home. This party was such a tradition for so many people that - years after my friend had moved out of the family home into his own place - people would still turn up at his parents house for the party. It took quite a few years for the message to spread to all that the party was not on anymore.

 

Now I love to spend new year with my family, just being at home, appreciating everything I have - the love of my family, the joy of our being together and the warmth and peace of spending time with them. I require nothing more than that on a New Year’s Eve. It completes my year, and gives me hope for the great unknown that is the future.

 

Cheers!