Is Fear Getting In Your Way?

In case you haven’t heard, we’re over a week into the 14 Day Get It Done Challenge: The challenge where you take care of ONE procrastinated task each day.

The truth is, there are all types of reasons we procrastinate.

• There are some tasks you procrastinate because they bore you. (Like scouring through piles of business receipts).
• There are some tasks you procrastinate because you dread them. (Like making a dentist appt.)
• There are some tasks you procrastinate because you’ve built them up in your head to be much bigger than they really are. (Like filing paperwork)

It’s so exciting to see the results and rewards from something as small as writing a thank you card, getting your car washed or picking some weeds.

But the most rewarding tasks I got off my long overdue to-do list were the ones I’d been scared of doing.

Yup, the ones that I fear.

• Like sending an email to someone that is “out of my league.”
• Like posting an ad for an assistant because training a new hire is a lot of work.
• Like asking for a speaking engagement because I’m afraid of a big fat NO.

Those things I’ve been putting off forever due to the fear of failure, hardship or rejection.

So during my last couple weeks of overcoming procrastination, I pushed myself to overcome the fear. Not surprisingly, the more I did it, the easier it became.

I realized that not getting a response to an email or even getting a “no” didn’t kill me. It didn’t impact my life in a significant way.

It was just a blip on the radar and I simply moved on to the next task I needed to do.

Fear is a procrastination tool, an enemy of progress.

TRUTH BOMB: This type of fear is usually irrational.

There’s only one way to find out if you what you’ve been procrastinating will shame you, hurt you, or cause you so much emotional pain that you should continue to put it off for another few weeks. Perhaps months? Maybe years?

Test it.

Run a tiny test at first: do a little of the task, and see what happens. Just 5-10 minutes of a scary task or doing a very easy, non-public project or task.

Don’t just glaze over this blog. Really do it. Like now.

Was it horrible? Are you still standing? Breathing? Able to move?

Chances are you’ll be fine and it wasn’t that bad.

Which gives you the confidence to move onto procrastinated fear-based task #2. And so on and so on.

So…What task have you been procrastinating because you’ve been guided by fear?

“What you are afraid to do is a clear indication of the next thing you need to do.”

Here’s to getting more of the right things done!

Xo,
Mridu