The 4 Root Causes of Procrastination

Procrastination is a universal phenomenon and most of us struggle with it.

But procrastination is not the problem. It’s a symptom of an underlying problem.

And as ever, your problems are unique to you. That’s why there’s no universal solution for procrastination.

Procrastination is not a time management problem.

There’s this general perception that procrastination is a problem of time management, self-control, self-discipline, or what you will. But forcing yourself to do things is never a sustainable strategy. It perpetuates an unnecessary struggle filled with frustration and guilt. Self-coercion not only mentally drains you but also makes it difficult for you to notice the underlying problems.

So instead of acting as an inefficient dictator over oneself or trying to find “hacks” to beat procrastination, our focus should be to step back and understand what’s causing it.

Because until you specifically diagnose your problems, fighting procrastination will always be an uphill battle. What follows is a simple framework to help you understand the root causes of procrastination.

Your base problem will mostly fall in one of these four buckets:

Avoidance

Avoidance is our default response to uncomfortable emotions.

When something makes us feel not so good, we instinctively seek an escape. We distract ourselves with mindless scrolling, video games, or entertainment. It’s our brain’s protective mechanism.

The modern world makes it even easier to escape your emotions instead of recognizing and dealing with them. Notice that whenever you need to do something uncomfortable, you’ll find yourself mindlessly scrolling on your phone. It happens almost unconsciously.

And then this emotional avoidance manifests as procrastination. The way out of avoidance is accepting your feelings and allowing yourself to feel without seeking an escape.

Acceptance sets you up to extract valuable information from your emotions and resolve them in a constructive manner.

Perfectionism

Our goals are often very idealistic. We chase fantasies and set impossible standards for ourselves. And when we realize that we won’t be able to live up to them, we get frustrated and give up entirely. This is just stupid.

Such all-or-nothing thinking encourages procrastination.

I’ve noticed this in my own behavior. If I have a bad start to the day, my tendency is to throw the entire day away instead of making the best of whatever is left. I’m sure you have observed this pattern in some other form.

Perfectionism is also a subtle way of self-sabotaging yourself out of fear. Going after what you want means taking risks and facing uncertainty. Staying in a familiar situation is comfortable. Here, perfectionism gives people the perfect internal rationalization to avoid public exposure, failure, or rejection. It’s an easy out.

You’ll often see such people focusing on unimportant tasks and perfecting irrelevant details. They’ll keep procrastinating in different ways and live on the idea of “I’ll start when I’m ready” or “someday I will…”.

The way out of perfectionism is realizing that something is better than nothing. And of course, not being a coward.

Ship stuff. The most effective way of building anything is consistent imperfect action and iteration through feedback.

Ambiguity

Procrastination is inevitable when you only have a vague sense of what you need to do or when you have ten different things on your to-do list.

Lack of clarity leads to uncertainty, which then creates anxiety. Faced with anxiety, we indulge in avoidant behavior.

When your goal is abstract, the task at hand seems more difficult than it actually is. How many times have you pushed something off incessantly and then later realized, “Oh that wasn’t such a big deal, I should have done it days ago”. Countless times for me.

The fix is to take your vague goals and turn them into specific tasks. For example, even something as simple as “exercise” is a bit vague. When you replace it with, say, “Do 100 push-ups” or “Go for a walk”, you significantly enhance your probability of following through with it.

This becomes even more important when you’re undertaking a complex project with a lot of moving parts. For example, “starting a business” is an abstract goal and will always seem daunting. But you can break it down to small, specific chunks that are individually simple and easy. Like you can start with “Do market research for 3 hours this week”.

The easier it is to start, the more likely you are to break the inertia of procrastination. Always map out the next steps and aim for operational clarity.

Of all the things you can do to fight procrastination, planning has the highest rewards-to-efforts ratio.

Fatigue

When you’re mentally fatigued or stressed, everything becomes more difficult. You feel unmotivated and overwhelmed. You lack self-control. Your mind exaggerates your fears. Managing your energy levels therefore becomes the most important thing when it comes to productivity.

This is where people abuse stimulants like coffee and nicotine. Not a wise strategy. You’ll develop tolerance and they’ll stop being effective. They also mask underlying problems. Save them for emergencies.

It’s the basic stuff that matters the most. Get your fundamentals — exercise, mindfulness, sleep, nutrition— on point.

Sometimes, when you’re feeling fatigued, a short nap can do wonders for your productivity. Sometimes, you need to shake yourself out of the funk. It’s counterintuitive, but a hard workout can drastically shift your mental state.

Anyway, the most important thing is to constantly cultivate awareness instead of going through life like a zombie. Awareness is what will enable you catch yourself and figure out the root cause of your procrastination.

When you find yourself being unproductive, keep the above four root causes of procrastination in mind — Avoidance, Perfectionism, Ambiguity, Fatigue (APAF, if you’ll allow me the acronym).

Or just remember these questions:

• Am I avoiding a difficult emotion or consequence?
• Am I chasing a fantasy? Am I being a perfectionist (read: coward)?
• Do I lack clarity? Am I unprepared?
• Am I tired?

One other cause of procrastination could be a lack of motivation. But just like procrastination, motivation is a byproduct of other factors. For instance, like we discussed above, if you’re feeling low or stressed or anxious, you’ll obviously feel unmotivated.

For now, realize that you have to learn to work with your mind instead of fighting against it. Stop coercing yourself into doing things.

I’m still learning how to do it. But it’s been a fundamental shift for me. Our goal should be to reach a place where we are naturally doing what’s good for us.

Thank you for reading. Most of the content on this website has emerged from conversations with readers like you.

Every Sunday, I send out an email dissecting some aspect of the human mind.

If you can take out a few minutes every week, I’ll help you develop a strong understanding of how your mind works. So that you can have more control over your thoughts, behavior, and life.

You can sign-up below.

Or you can sign-up after reading my story and the core idea behind this website:  We Should Be Getting More Out of Our Lives (would recommend)