by Joel Southerland
Preachers can be the worst procrastinators around.
We have all these tasks that need to be done and there are notes and scribbles and mental To-Do lists everywhere of things we need to do . . . . eventually!
When we live in that constant state of procrastination it is extremely stressful.
Neil Fiore in his book, The Now Habit, says:
The procrastination habit catches people in a vicious cycle: get overwhelmed, feel pressured, fear failure, try harder, work longer, feel resentful, lose motivation, and then procrastinate. The cycle starts with the pressure of being overwhelmed and ends with an attempt to escape through procrastination. As long as you are caught in the cycle, there is no escape. You can’t even enjoy the recuperative and creative benefits of guilt-free leisure time. Suddenly, any time spent on play-and even time spent on more enjoyable work-feels like an uneasy shirking from what you should be doing.
So what do you do about that?
First, make a list. Not a To-Do list but a list of everything written on a note or running through your head that you know you ought to do or need to do that you have been putting off. Just get every single item on one sheet of paper. This one task alone will relieve you of a lot of stress.
Then, work on the list. Do the simplest and shortest tasks first and move on down the line. When another item comes to mind, write it on the list. Don’t worry about order – focus on production.
Before you know it, you will have the list accomplished and the feeling and stress of procrastination will be gone!
You will become – The Producing Preacher!!
22 October 2009 at 3:40 pm
Hi Joel,
Thanks for posting this. It may sound like common sense but it is so timely because I am feeling a little overwhelmed right now. Will put it into practice!
28 October 2009 at 3:22 pm
I do something similar. I take a few pieces of paper, fold them in half and staple them like a book. Then I break it up in to squares for days…and there you have it the poor man’s day planner. I list the things I want to accomplish and mark them off as I go. The great thing about it being on an inexpensive few pieces of paper is I can fold it up into my pocket and take it with me. Another thing that God has blessed me with is my reading a book called Planning Your Sermons, I now plan my sermon series months in advance and I don’t have any more Saturday night jitters!
16 December 2009 at 12:04 pm
I use Google Calendars (which is the dirt cheap man’s day planner since it’s FREE). I put everything in there and set it to send me an email reminder. When I’m procrastinating (usually at the computer with the email, that pesky little nag says, “Call so and so!” or “Do text Study!” When I don’t get to a task Google Calendar let’s me simply drag tasks to the next calendar day where it will send me another email nag tomorrow. I like to keep my inbox relatively clean so it really bugs me until the task can be completed and deleted.