Reframing procrastination

Procrastination prevents us from living a fulfilling life, yet we still do it—why? In Procrastination, psychologists Lenora Yuen and Jane Burka argue that we procrastinate to experience short-term relief from our fear of working on certain tasks. Fortunately, they claim you can beat procrastination and learn to live a more fulfilling life if you accept reality’s constraints and learn healthier ways to manage your fears. In this guide, you’ll learn how to…

• Identify the fears that lead you to procrastinate
• Reflect on how your biology, circumstances, and self-esteem affect your procrastination
• Learn to set and achieve realistic goals
• Better control how you manage your emotions and time

Throughout this guide, we’ll contextualize the authors’ ideas among those of other experts, such as James Clear and Bhante Gunaratana. Furthermore, we’ll supplement the authors’ strategies with additional actionables, such as how to start practicing mindfulness and how to stop avoiding exercise.

You have goals to achieve and plans to make them happen—but you’re constantly sabotaging your progress toward getting them done. How? By procrastinating: leaving tasks for “later” or “tomorrow” when you could really be working on them today. In Solving the Procrastination Puzzle, psychologist Timothy A. Pychyl contends that you aren’t procrastinating because you’re bad at managing your time. Instead, you’re procrastinating because you haven’t learned how to handle your emotions—the negative emotions that pop up each time you consider working on a dreaded task.

In this guide, we’ll take you through Pychyl’s research-based insights into what procrastination is and how it’s undermining your ability to live a happy, healthy life. Then, we’ll dive into the reasons you’re procrastinating and explore Pychyl’s advice for changing your habits in the short and long term. We’ll also compare his ideas with those of other psychology and productivity experts who’ve studied procrastination, and we’ll look at additional strategies for changing your relationship with your most dreaded tasks.

The word “productivity” typically doesn’t bring to mind self-care behaviors such as sleeping in and enjoying a leisurely meal with friends. But in Working Hard, Hardly Working, entrepreneur and influencer Grace Beverley insists that self-care and productivity aren’t opposites—they actually require each other. She argues that you can improve your life and avoid burnout by recognizing that productive work leaves you with more time for self-care, and self-care boosts your productivity by energizing you.

In this guide, we’ll explore Beverley’s advice for improving your self-care and productivity. You’ll learn how to use your work time wisely, make work tasks more enjoyable, and pursue self-care that leaves you feeling replenished. We’ll also supplement Beverley’s insights by offering tips from other self-care and productivity experts and providing historical context, such as the origins of our culture of overwork.

In Trauma Stewardship, Laura van Dernoot Lipsky writes that we can better care for others who have gone through trauma by learning to care for ourselves—a practice she calls trauma stewardship. Trauma, loss, and suffering are everyday realities, damaging not only to those who suffer from these challenges directly, but also to the caregivers who witness and tend to others’ trauma. Lipsky argues that to be fully present and emotionally available to others, we must address the impact of secondary trauma (the harm we experience when exposed to others’ trauma). Lipsky's trauma stewardship framework addresses how to manage secondary trauma, create a better work-life balance, and practice mindful self-care so you can support others to your fullest capacity.

In this guide, we’ll explain Lipsky’s concept of trauma stewardship, discuss the warning signs of secondary trauma, and provide ways you can replenish your energy for healthy caregiving. Along the way, we’ll provide additional psychological insights about trauma exposure and other experts’ advice on self-care and compassion.

Join Mel Robbins, the accomplished trailblazer in personal development, in "The Mel Robbins Podcast" as she dives into the intricacies of entrepreneurial triumph and the art of time management. Reveling in the podcast's extraordinary achievements, being ranked among the top globally on premier platforms, Robbins and her all-female team exemplify the power of determination and strategic goal setting. Her journey from a celebrated keynote speaker to a social media influencer and now a podcast phenom frames a success story that's as instructive as it is inspiring.

Robbins offers an arsenal of actionable advice woven through her conversation with Chris Allen at the Entrepreneur Studio. Covering a spectrum that ranges from combatting negative news consumption to the merits and pitfalls of business partnerships, she arms entrepreneurs with the tools needed to foster resilience and growth. Incorporating a mix of personal experience and research, such as insights from Dr. Judith Willis on stress management, Robbins crafts a narrative that intertwines self-care with professionalism, encourages overcoming imposter syndrome, and redefines what it means to be a successful woman in business. This episode is not just a lighthouse for navigating business uncertainties, but a manifesto for personal and professional reinvention.