Transcription
You know exactly what needs to be done and how. You sincerely want to do it, but for some reason, you don't. Does this situation sound familiar? It's quite strange. And even if you manage to force yourself somehow, you quickly get distracted by trivial matters, or you find it difficult to concentrate, your thoughts wander anywhere. Anything just to avoid thinking about what needs to be done right now. Everything I've listed is a manifestation of procrastination. In other words, it's an internal resistance to certain important tasks. Now I will explain how procrastination works from a scientific perspective, but in very simple terms. I will rely not on the opinion of any single person, not on a single study, but on a meta-analysis. This means it's a generalization of the conclusions of all significant scientific works on procrastination up to 2006. As a result of this analysis, four key factors were identified, on which the activation of resistance to a task depends. And the author combined this into a simple formula that can be used to manage one's desire to act, one's motivation. And at the end, I will tell you what is usually overlooked in similar studies. The fact is that scientists usually focus on how things are structured, what is connected to what, what depends on what. But the practical application of this knowledge depends on specific specialists who work directly with people, as they say, "in the field." This gap between theory and practice is very clearly visible in this meta-analysis. The author himself identified one of the four key elements. He described it, he provided a lot of data showing a very clear correlation between procrastination and this factor in most studies. And yet, he does not include it in his formula. I myself was very surprised, I reread it several times, but the person literally couldn't fit a certain fact into his theory, and he simply discarded it, ignored it, calling it a self-evident fact, but for some reason excluding it from what could be influenced. I have been specializing in procrastination therapy for the last 3 years, independently of these studies and theories, simply through the practice of cognitive-behavioral therapy, I have essentially also arrived at the conditions on which the natural desire to act depends. But in the solution I propose, this element that the author simply discarded is taken into account. So, let's move on to this meta-analysis and what the author concluded. In 2006, Dr. Piers Steel synthesized the findings of all studies on procrastination. To do this, he drew on sources from various fields. There were studies in psychology, economics, and even "litology" (likely a typo, possibly referring to a specific field or a misinterpretation). A total of 553 works were included. Essentially, his goal was to find what many researchers, independently of each other, agreed upon. That is, whether there were recurring facts that carried over from one study to another, regarding how sources were selected and how the entire study was conducted. If you are a fan of scientific articles, you can read the original. I will provide a link to the article in the description below this video. Also, if you wish, you can read a translation into Russian. I had it done by a neural network. Although it's a bit rough, everything is understandable. If you want to get both the original article and the translation, go to my Telegram channel, the link to which will be in the description. I will attach both files there. Let me reiterate what is understood by procrastination. It is the voluntary postponement of important tasks, despite understanding that it will only make things worse. In essence, it is a failure of self-regulation, it is irrational human behavior. And by generalizing various studies, 26 possible factors influencing procrastination were identified. Among them were those that are commonly heard. If you open any article on procrastination, any book, certain causes will be listed. The analysis showed that some things do not influence the occurrence of procrastination as much as is commonly believed. That is, researchers managed to dispel some myths about procrastination. And I decided to share this with you as well. For example, it was believed that some people postpone things until the last moment because they are seeking thrills. That is, they are adrenaline junkies. They like to put everything off and then do it with a rush and bring it to completion. It turned out that the connection with this factor is very weak. Earlier, a factor called rebellion was identified. I've also made videos about this. This is when a person has an internal protest; they resist any imposed prescriptions or rules. If a person is assigned something to do, they perceive it as a restriction of freedom. And therefore, they resist, and this manifests as procrastination. And this meta-analysis showed that such cases account for no more than 5%. That is, it cannot be considered something common to all people. And perhaps the most surprising thing the author discovered is that the influence of perfectionism is very small, despite the fact that it is considered almost one of the main factors. And in practically every book on procrastination, and in therapy, it is often said that perfectionism, as it were, drives a person to strive for an unattainable ideal. As a result, the person gives up on acting because it is pointless. And in my practice, I also confirm this: perfectionism, well, it truly exists, it truly has an influence, but it's a separate case. And I even have a separate video dedicated to perfectionism and procrastination. There, I show the entire scheme, what unfolds within a person, what their internal schema is, and as a result, it leads them to a state of perfectionism paralysis, where a person simply cannot get moving. And finally, let's get to the most important part. What did the author conclude? What are the most significant key factors that influence the occurrence of procrastination? For now, I will just list them. The first factor is an aversive task. That is, how unpleasant or repulsive it is for a person. This is a purely subjective factor related to the characteristics of the task itself. The second factor is the time until reward or punishment is received. In many studies, not only psychological ones, it has been found that the further in time the consequences of something are from us, the less it influences our behavior. The third factor is called self-efficacy. This term was introduced by the scientist Albert Bandura. Essentially, it means a person's belief that they can perform the necessary actions to achieve a result. And the fourth factor is called delay sensitivity. In other words, it is impulsivity. That is, how easily a person gets distracted, how difficult it is for them to maintain focus on a task. And Dr. Steel, in 2007, combined all these four key factors and created his theory, which he called the Theory of Temporal Motivation. And he presented it in the form of a simple formula. This is a version of the formula from Wikipedia. Let's break it down. So, the first multiplier is the expectation that the person's actions will lead to success. Essentially, he included Bandura's self-efficacy here. The second, "value," is subjective value, meaning the person's expectation of receiving some reward associated with the results of their actions. In the denominator, the first multiplier is the person's delay sensitivity, or in other words, impulsivity, the tendency to get distracted. And the last multiplier is the delay. The time until reward or punishment is received. In reality, the author does not provide specific recommendations on how to manage one's motivation through this formula. He only offers some direction for thought, some approximate recommendations, and directions for further research. The good news is that since I have been specializing in procrastination therapy for several years, I have a large set of tools for influencing each element of this formula. But first, we need to get a complete picture. As I said at the beginning, I was surprised that the author himself identified one of the key factors and then, as it were, simply discarded it and did not consider it in his formula. I am talking about the very first factor: aversive tasks. You can see on the slide that this is also known as the dysphoric effect, meaning the attractiveness or unattractiveness of a task for a person. And this factor is not taken into account in this formula at all. But I will now tell you how to account for it. The most interesting thing is that this aversive task is always the very first thing I encounter in procrastination therapy. A person doesn't think in formulas; they simply report the problem. And in most cases, it turns out that the task the person resists evokes some unpleasant emotions. And the person is often running not from the task itself, but from the emotions, the unpleasant sensations that the task causes. It is very important to realize one truth. I convey this to literally every client. The fact is that every action is essentially neutral, and only our psyche colors everything in different shades. The fact is that our perception is determined, firstly, by past experience, psychological traumas, certain cognitive distortions, stereotypes, and prejudices. That is, we perceive the world through the lens of our attitudes and beliefs. It is very often discovered that a person has some negative experience that is somehow associatively linked to the upcoming task. And essentially, this negative experience and the associated negative emotions are automatically transferred to this task. Let's take a simple example. Suppose I am a student and I need to prepare for an English exam. And I notice that, on the one hand, I understand why this is necessary. I believe that I will somehow succeed, but at the same time, I still postpone it until the last moment. And if we examine my past, we might find, for example, that in school, I had an English teacher who, I don't know, humiliated me when I couldn't pronounce a word correctly. She would really, say, bully me. She would say that I was stupid, and because of that, I felt shame, guilt. I felt like I was somehow not good enough, worse than others. And essentially, I couldn't express it to my teacher because she was big, and I was small and defenseless. I also felt helpless. So, English is associated with a very difficult life situation and some suppressed emotions for me. And now, as an adult, when I even approach the English department at the university, I still have some unpleasant sensations and feelings. And every time I sit down to prepare and realize that I can't pronounce something correctly, this image, as it were, arises, and it awakens in me the feeling of guilt again, that I am somehow worthless, somehow worse than others. This negative experience cannot be excluded. This is precisely what makes studying English an aversive task for me. Another good example is provided by the author in the study itself. He mentions that there was a study that found, for instance, that people who postpone buying gifts until the last moment turn out to dislike going to stores. This is an aversive task for them. But researchers don't delve deeper. Why is it unpleasant for a person to go to stores? Why don't they like it? There can be very different reasons. They are all subjective. They are determined by some life experience. For example, one person, when they go to a store and encounter the fact that they cannot afford what they want, they also feel shame, as if they are somehow poor and therefore worse than others. This also resonates with their childhood experience, when they were the poorest in class and observed that other children dressed differently, had different school supplies, and had less pocket money on trips. All of this activates feelings of shame and humiliation in them. And this is precisely why this situation now "bugs" them when they go to the store. It might also turn out that a person simply has social anxiety. They feel anxious when there are many people around. They feel anxious asking a sales assistant, they feel anxious at the checkout. That is, the aversiveness, the unpleasant task, arises as a consequence of having some neurosis. And a neurosis is caused by past experience, their attitudes, and beliefs. I have managed to identify five universal psychological conditions on which intrinsic motivation depends. That is, the natural desire to act – when you don't have to force yourself, but you independently want to take action. In my version of the productivity formula, all the factors identified in the meta-analysis are taken into account. But I have also added some of my own details that are truly practical. For example, knowing what to do and how to do it. This is a seemingly obvious point, but it causes many problems. Aversiveness, meaning the unpleasantness of the task, is considered in the third condition of the productivity formula. I emphasize that simplicity is not only physical, how easy it is for me to do something, but also psychological. And it is precisely here that there are many pitfalls that I, as a practicing psychologist specializing in procrastination therapy, know about. There are many factors that make a task psychologically more difficult for a person. And, consequently, there are many tools to simplify it for oneself. And the truly amazing thing is that what Perstil discarded from his formula, what he stopped considering, turned out to be the most important, the key element for helping a person overcome procrastination. I have recorded a separate video lecture about my productivity formula. It lasts 67 minutes. And I have also prepared a workbook for it. The main idea reflected is that these five elements of the formula are purely subjective, and this means that they can be influenced in some way. That is, your intrinsic motivation, your natural desire to act, is a completely manageable story. You can take literally any task and check it against each condition. If you find that one of them is not met, it means your motivation is decreasing. And the risk of procrastinating is higher. If two or three conditions are not met, then it is guaranteed that you will procrastinate. And the solution is that you can find the unmet element, take a specific tool, and apply it to correct your motivation. This lecture on the productivity formula comes with a workbook that contains all the exercises. I emphasize again that the section on simplicity, on Steel's aversiveness, has the most exercises, as there are many factors that psychologically complicate the task for a person. If you are interested in this lecture, you can familiarize yourself with the introductory part. For 490 rubles, I offer the opportunity to listen to the introductory part. Essentially, in the introduction, I explain the productivity formula in more detail. I reveal the meaning of each element of the formula and provide one real-life example of how to influence each element independently. But if you want a complete tool for working with your procrastination, something to really immerse yourself in, it's still simple. I naturally considered that people with procrastination would listen to this lecture, so I simplified everything as much as possible, provided more real-life examples. And in the workbook, I also write an example for each exercise. I tried to adhere to the productivity formula itself, meaning to simplify working with your procrastination as much as possible for you. To make it easier for me to deliver these materials, I have created two special Telegram bots. One Telegram bot provides the introductory lecture for 490 rubles, and the second bot provides the full lecture for 6,000 rubles. If you purchase the introductory lecture for 490, you will receive an additional discount on the full lecture. Therefore, this is something I generally recommend starting with. It will allow you to familiarize yourself with my teaching style and the product itself. There will also be a summary of this lecture. You can see how everything is presented. At the same time, it also offers some benefits. Go to the Telegram bot. The link will be in the description. And if you are simply interested in the topic of procrastination and restoring productivity, then give this video a like and subscribe to the channel.