The Hidden Dangers of Procrastination: Master Productivity!

Hi, I'm Kamilah Stevenson, and this is an episode of Health Goat. Today I want to talk about getting you out of the puzzle of procrastination. Now I know that's something that everybody deals with, you know, all of us deal with putting things off for tomorrow, the things that we should be doing today. And sometimes even for myself, I don't know why I'm doing it. I feel that I'm doing it, and I'm not sure if a lot of people are always self-aware, but I pretty much am self-aware when I am not doing something that I really should be doing. And sometimes I don't know if it's the right thing to do because I'm just so busy and overwhelmed, or I just need to take a moment for self-care. And, you know, I'm trying to balance my world. Um, I don't know often even if it's because of, you know, I just want to enjoy this moment and I don't want to feel like I have to do something you know, that I don't want to do, you know, but I don't know if that often is psychologically compromising other areas of my life. And that's what I started to wonder and think about. And I hope that you start to think about that too. And I'll share some things that come with procrastination, what it is and how you can really break out of the cycle so that you can live a life of higher levels of output and productivity. Because at the end of the day, we're going to be miserable if we miss out on things that we know we should have done. And one of the things that I've recognized, even with listening to experts who have done research on procrastination, is that most of the time they come up with this idea of if there is a regret of omission or a regret of commission. And what that means is that You know, sometimes people regret doing the wrong things, but then sometimes people regret not doing something that they should have done. And really, I mean, there's, there's a lot of maybe guilt or shame on both ends, but some of the experts have found is that the regret of not doing something, of putting something off that, you know, you should have been doing, uh, is, is it causes the greatest level of grief and regret. And I can't imagine, you know, getting to a place or a time in my life in the future, and I look back and I consider all of the dreams that I had, all of the, the goals that I had, all of the achievements that I wanted to, you know, accomplish, and all of the success that I wanted to attain. And the only reason why I didn't attain it is because I learned the cycle of procrastination, you know, and that's kind of devastating when I think about that. And so that's, that's what got me to wondering about this, this issue with procrastination and what causes it and how we can really start to reprocess ourselves, you know, One of the things that you must realize about yourself is that you are in a cycle of being who you are. You are in a cycle of being yourself, and you have to take a step back for a moment and wonder, what does that look like? Because I'll tell you this, whatever you are and whatever you do, it is very much so predictable at this point. Like, your, your movements are very predictable, and even if you don't know they're predictable, trust me, other people know that you're predictable. So if you sit back and think for a minute, like, what would other people say about me? What would other people say I would do or I would not do? Um, would someone look at me as a person who would take a risk and, you know, go for it, go for my dreams? Or would somebody say, oh no, this person wouldn't do that, you wouldn't do this, you wouldn't do that? Like, think back about what other people would have to say about you, about your integrity, about your momentum, about your leadership, about your communication, about how healthy your relationships are, about your health, about your finances, about these important things in life, about you, you being a parent, your parenting styles. You know, kids recognize like what we are as parents. And you know, I I would, when I was younger, me and my sister, we would, um, you know, conjure up if we were going to ask our parents for something, you know, let's go ask Mommy for this, let's go ask Daddy for this. And a lot of times we would know if they were going to say yes or no by the predictability of what we have observed in past times. And so like my father, he, he rarely said no when we were growing up. The most kind, sweet man who cares so much and will run to your rescue, especially when you're in danger or you had an accident. I remember when I broke my ankle and he came showing up at the hospital, and I knew he'd be the first one there. Why? Because of the type of person he is. Like, he's very overprotective. If something is wrong with you, he's going to want to know. He's just very caring. And him being an individual, I knew that he would show up very, very quickly. I mean, I remember being in the hospital out of town, uh, one time when I was pregnant with my son, and the next day after being in the hospital in a different state, in walks my dad. And I'm like, how did you even get here? And how did you get here this quick? But it is because of the type of person he is. So when you're constantly showing yourself to do something, to take action on something, or to not take action on something, or to approve something, or to not approve something, as me and my sister would observe when we were younger, uh, it, it creates a pattern of who you are. And that's a pattern that usually most people don't get out of because it is a pattern that is happening without sometimes their cooperation or even their consciousness. So with that being said, a lot of times when we find ourselves procrastinating, usually we don't know that we're procrastinating. And whatever reason is making us procrastinate, we don't even recognize why we're doing it. And That's where we have to take a step back and start to look and try to break this and put the pieces back together again. And the reason why is because if you find yourself doing this from day to day, then you are doing it with the things in your life that you should be taking action on and you should be doing it, but you don't even know you're doing it. As a matter of fact, You are possibly stuck in a rut that you don't even know you're stuck in. However, you have to live with the consequences of that place that you're stuck in every single day. And I don't know if you've compared what those consequences look like up against what it would look like if you were to break out of the cycle of procrastination or break out of the cycle of being who you are and yourself and the predictabilities that you have that are leading you down a path of, uh, destruction, honestly, and reckless even habits, or even just not being able to fulfill the life that you were supposed to fulfill. Purpose means everything, and if you are not living out your purpose, then you are wasting days, you are wasting time And there is nothing more valuable than your time because time is restricted and it is limited. Money you can make, you can get, you can, you know, uh, figure out a way to get resources to that degree. But time is something that is very, very hard to get back. As a matter of fact, that's why I love helping people to get healthy and well, because a lot of times that is one of the quickest ways to redeem your time. Because why does someone have to wind up losing out on life just because they won't make a decision to choose to eat healthy, for example? Like, life and death, you have the control over that a lot of times. You have the decisions that you can make that can extend your days, or you can accelerate your days. You can deteriorate. And a lot of people are deteriorating, and they're choosing to do so, and they don't realize that they're choosing to do so because the habits that they build up to do the same thing over and over, they have not recognized that it is a pattern and it is something that they are constantly buying into and constantly sowing into their life and into their outcome. And of course, life is nothing but a reflection of you. You know, at the end of the day, when we do certain things and we don't recognize it, it's like a lot of times we start to play the victim role when we don't recognize it. And that's why it's really important to open your eyes and to start to see things about yourself that are there. Uh, because you may be at a place in your life and you don't know how to take responsibility because you think the outside world and everybody else has gotten you where you are. They're the reasons why. Oh, you know, my boss didn't give me the raise I was supposed to have. The bank didn't give me the loan I was supposed to have. You know, someone betrayed me. This person kicked me out. Uh, that person, you know, did this or did that. And a lot of times we honestly think that it's everybody else that is making our life what it is, and we're often looking to respond to life based off of what life is doing to us. And so a lot of times we want good things to happen even before we can respond in a positive way. Just like your happiness, people are waiting on something to happen to make them happy instead of being happy where they are and trying to foresight and forecast where they want to go and pulling the emotions and the joy and the peace out of that futuristic moment and making sure that they find a way to experience it now. Because when you learn how to start experiencing it now then life will start to reflect the happiness, the peace, and the joy that you decided and made a decision to have now. It's like when you look in the mirror, you're waiting on the mirror to smile to you before you smile to it. But if we all know the mirror, when we stand in front of the mirror, we will not see a smile unless we smile first, right? So we have to get to a place where we take the actions that we need to take. And no, I'm not talking about willpower, okay? I'm not just talking about willpower because willpower will only get you so far. Yes, it's— it can be great for some people. It makes them do the things that they should do when they don't really feel like doing it. But let me just tell you this: when you're up against and you're contrasting the difference between, let's say, imagination and willpower, imagination will always outdo willpower. And the reason why is because imagination is from the subconscious parts of us, whereas willpower is from the conscious parts of us. And the behaviors and the self-sabotaging mechanisms that we have, they are subconscious. We don't know that we're doing it. So when you take a moment and you should be getting something done, whether it's at work or whatever, you're supposed to be doing something and you decide to pull your phone out and start scrolling through social media. You know at that moment, you know at that moment that you should be doing something different. What seems to happen is we start to feel a sense of delight in the moment and we trick ourselves into thinking that we'll feel like it better later. We'll, we'll feel like it tomorrow. But guess what? We never feel like it tomorrow. When tomorrow comes, we wish we had did it yesterday. And here's another day that now we have to get something done that we don't want to get done. And so the procrastination continues because you put it off another day. Or— now this is something I do all the time. I'm not gonna sit here and and say that I don't. Or you can have things happen for real in life, like, that gives you an excuse to not do what you know you should have done, and you're kind of happy about it. You know, like when you are supposed to, you know, go do something, uh, or whether it's meet somebody for lunch or whatever, and it starts to, uh, storm or it starts to rain or, or whatever, and it's like, oh, now the weather is bad. Oh, I'm not going to be able to make it because the weather is bad, you know. And now you feel relieved because you have a legitimate reason to not do what you really didn't want to do in the first place. And deep down inside you, you were looking for a way out. And the reason why now you feel okay about it is because something happened that gives you the justification for your sabotaging behavior patterns to constantly be in this cycle of procrastination. And so therefore, because life works that way, and there's always these things that start happening, you know, where, you know, it's a real interruption, and, and it makes you feel better now because now we're playing the blame game. And that's what I mean by getting into a, a, a, a mode of, of victimization, because we're looking for reasons, we're looking for— we're scouting for justifications. And I guarantee you that when you're looking for the justification and you're looking for the reasons, they're gonna come. Just like if someone is absolutely determined to do something, like, they're going to find the reasons that make them do it, not the reasons that make them not do it, because they are determined. And this isn't a 'I should,' this is a 'I must.' And when you get to that place where you're like, 'I have to go and do this or do that,' then you're not gonna have many reasons that stop you. You're actually going to have all the reasons in the world to actually make you do them, but it's all about what you're looking for. And so that's the thing with procrastination, is that it's about what you're looking for. And if you're looking for the ability to do things only when you want to do them, then you're going to really be stuck, and you're not going to be able to really be as productive and as successful as you want to be. And that is concerning anything, whether like it's your health, whether it is your relationships, whether it's that business that you're supposed to start, whether it's that book that you're supposed to start writing. Like, nothing's going to happen for you because you are on autopilot and you are living each day the same way. And so it's time to break out of that web. Because if you don't break out of that web, you're going to find yourself miserable, and you're going to find yourself with a lot of regret in life that you can't fix because the time has become more and more limited for you. And so that's why I believe that anytime you have an opportunity to make a change that's going to be good for your future, you should do it. And anytime you have an eye-opening moment and you start to ponder, what things am I doing in my that I'm not quite aware of that I need to fix. The moment that happens, you should take action right away because you want to start developing these habits of making sure that you do not put things off that you don't need to put off. And you may think it's small, and you may think it's something that I could do later, but I'm telling you, once you realize this moment, every single moment that you buy into procrastination, it is setting yourself up for being a way— is setting yourself up for having a personality that does what that personality does. And I'm not connecting this again to your identity, and I'm not saying that you are a procrastinator. I am saying that you probably procrastinate, and some people do it more than others, but you at least have to be aware that you do it. And then you have to find out how much are you doing it and how consistent you are doing it and how much it has affected all of the other areas of your life in context to that one moment. And when you start to see it that way, you'll start to make changes very quickly. Because you won't look at this as a minimal thing. You won't look at this as a small thing that you're supposed to get up and go clean up or clean your closet out and you've been waiting an extra week to do it. No, you're going to do it because you're going to say, this right here, this moment and this decision not to clean my closet when I know I decided to do it is probably the reason why I have not started the business that I wanted to start, or I haven't done something else that I wanted to do that I really have planned to do and I desire to do, but I am so stuck in a subconscious mode of being that I didn't even realize why I haven't gotten it done. Now, I know a lot of this stuff does tie into childhood trauma often and other things, because a lot of times when you procrastinate, you have to understand that procrastination is a psychological issue. It's not like laziness. And some people wonder, am I just being lazy, or am I, you know, being just a procrastinator, or I'm procrastinating? And what you got to understand about laziness— let's separate the two. Laziness is a biological issue. Laziness comes from a lot of different things, but a lot of them are usually biological. So I understand when people are lazy because they have too much sugar in their body, it's gonna tire them out, and then they're not gonna want to do anything. And so usually when people identify with their body, meaning I'm tired, I don't have the energy, I'm drained, I have fatigue, usually that makes them not want to do something because they're identifying with their body. It's just like when I was pregnant, you know, my hormones were a little different, and pregnancy tires you out. And so when you're pregnant, you do tend to more so be lazy, and that's because you got a lot of things going that is making you not have the energy that you need to do what you need to do. And so some people are just quite frankly lazy, and if they change their lifestyle routine, they can come out of that laziness because all of a sudden their bodies will experience a more balanced blood sugar levels. It will experience more energy, you being able to wake up out of bed and not have to go and, you know, load up on caffeine all day and things like that because, you know, they're getting their proper amount of sleep, they're getting their proper amount of sunlight, you know, they're making sure that they are maybe taking the supplements that they need to take because they're deficient in something. They're making sure that their mineral levels are well. You know, there's again a lot of reasons why people's biological, uh, order of being is not where it needs to be on an energy level. And so that's laziness. It is a biological, um, address that you need to focus on. And so when you are being lazy and you legitimately are drained, then you need to fix more your lifestyle issues. However, procrastination is not a biological issue. Procrastination is a psychological issue. And when we say psychological, a lot of times— and this is why I say it links sometimes to childhood trauma or something that happened previous in your life— a lot of times people procrastinate because they quite frankly don't believe in themselves, and they need a reason to not do something because they have the fear of failure. And if they fail, it reminds them that they are not good enough and so instead of doing something and just taking their chances with whether they will succeed or whether they will fail, they create distance between themselves and the action that they should take so that they don't have to live that moment of thinking, I told you I wasn't good enough. And so that becomes a lot of times the issue of procrastination. Everybody has a different story, a different, uh, way of being, and different experiences that they've had in their life. And when we have experiences in our life, you know, it's interesting how they affect us later on in life, because whatever the event was that happened, it is actually in the past. It is no longer in the present. So why is the present being affected by the past? Well, I'll tell you why. It is because in the past, when that event happened, it's not about the event itself. Itself, it's about what happened inside of you because of that event, or what you thought about yourself as a result of that event. And whatever that thing is, that belief system that you created based off of that event, you come into the present and you are still being reminded of it. And there are things in the present day that are happening that links you back to that. So the only connection you still really have to the past is really the memory of. And so when that memory continues to be rehearsed because of something that's happening in life, it glues you and it sticks you to the past. And the problem with that is you become this person who lives constantly in a cycle of the past. And if you live in the cycle of the past, you cannot create the future. And so that is why you can't push forward out of procrastination, because you are still glued to yesterday. And we have to get out of that. We cannot live each life like Groundhog Day, you know, the same thing over and over. And it happens in relationships a lot of times too, where, you know, different face, same personality that is being drawn to you, or that you are representing out of yourself to draw other people to. And it is something that needs to finally be recognized because if it's not recognized, you're gonna wake up every day and it's like you're not really woke, you're sleepwalking. And I often say this a lot of times, you never know when you're woke until you wake up, right? Like, I, I know that that's, that's a weird statement, but you don't know that you're sleeping until you wake up. You don't know that you were sleep until you wake up. And so you don't know that you're woke until you wake up. So a lot of people are sleeping and they don't know that they're sleeping because they're not woke, because they would know when they wake up that they're woke. But you don't know that when you're sleeping. And I'm not trying to twist the understanding of this concept, trust me. I'm trying to get you to understand that if you are sleeping, if you are stuck in a subconscious pattern of delaying the thing that you should be taking action on, you will not know it. But as I said, because of your predictability, other people will know it. It's interesting how other people sometimes know you better than you know yourself, you know. And the problem is we live our lives sometimes just too much for other people. You know, we, we're investing in everything other than ourselves. We know everybody other than ourselves. We don't know— we get to a point in life where we don't know what we like, what we don't like, you know, what makes us happy. There are some people, when you ask them what makes you happy, they say, I do not know, because I have lived so much in a way where I am just trying to make other people happy. It doesn't matter. And I'm not saying that this is like something that is, uh, that, that we try to do. Like, I don't care if it's your kids, you know, like sometimes even if you're a single parent, you tend to do things for your kids if they're missing out on another parent to make up for it. And so I, I don't say that we're doing this out of like in a negative way. I, I say this because a lot of times we are caring human beings and we do tend to you know, make sure that everybody else is well. But the problem with that is that you're not well. And what you have to remember is that you have to be well to fully give yourself and make yourself more valuable to the people around you. So one of the things I often tell my, my clients when I'm helping them to reverse chronic disease or diabetes, high blood pressure, you know, the, the symptoms of autoimmune disease and thyroid problems and all of those different things is that you cannot be as valuable as you really genuinely want to be to your family, even if you're not well. If you are restricted and you're sick and you're glued to, you know, a machine, or if you are, you know, in pain, you got chronic fatigue, you got high blood pressure issues, uh, you are on medication, you are ripping and running to the hospital You know, that's time away from your family and things that you really could be doing. Or you just too tired to rip and run with your grandkids, or you can't travel to go see the people that you love that don't live in your proximity. You might have a best friend out of town, or you might have family out of town, or you may just want to go enjoy your life and be on a vacation with people you enjoy being around, and you can't do that because you're sick. Well, how valuable are you if you can't really function at full capacity? You might be a little valuable. I'm not saying that you're just not at all, but I'm saying if you really want to be more valuable to the people around you in your world, if you want to be more valuable to the people who you serve— like, let's say you're a leader and you're serving if you want to be more valuable to your job in, in whatever position you're in, then you really want to get your mind, your soul, your body, your brain together. Because if you can't think good because you have too much inflammation in the brain due to, let's say, a bad diet or too much sugar, um, you know, you're addicted, or you might have some kind of vice or some kind of addiction. You might be, you know, drinking too much, on drugs. You might have an addiction of gambling. You might have an addiction of watching TV all day. All of these different addictions, they decrease the quality of your life. They actually decrease your dopamine levels so that you don't really enjoy life, and you create this need for something that you think you want and you think it is making you happy, but it is actually the culprit behind your unhappiness and the culprit behind your stress and the culprit behind your dissatisfaction with how things are going. And it makes you desensitized to really having heightened levels of experiences when you are supposed to be happy and joyful because you are addicted. And these kind of vices and these kind of things will just really diminish the power of your being, the power of who you are. And so I think that it is at least time to wake up and ponder these questions about: am I as productive as I want to be? Am I doing the things that I love doing in life, or am I miserable? Am I working a job I don't want to work? Do I have the kind of finances that I want to have? And if I don't, is that stopping me from experiencing life the way I want to experience it? Is it stopping me from being as generous as I need to be to other people? One of the reasons why we can't observe our self-sabotaging behavior patterns is because of social proof. And what has become the norm. Like, if we continue to look to other people, and for example social media, as to what this person is doing and what that person is doing and what is acceptable, and making that the pace of what's normal for our world, we're going to be in a lot of trouble because we're going to find ourselves in a whirlwind of toxicity and dysfunction. You see, we're actually living in the day where mental stability is rare. That is the thing that the minority experience. And we're just looking at the communication and all of the narcissism and all of the self-absorbed behavior patterns, and we think that it's okay. And it's very frustrating to watch certain toxic behavior patterns and then watch people justify them because they are in an environment and in a culture of normality where we can super disrespect people and we can, you know, treat people like they are nothing, or we can stomp on top of people to get ahead in life. And we can lie and be shady and just be ugly and say demeaning things to people and just do what we want. We can abuse whoever we want. We could say whatever we want. We could do whatever we want because this is our world and this is, you know, and I'm important. I'm more important than you. And so we can continue to dishonor and disdain and just be as nasty and as ugly as I have ever seen some people be. I am turned off by it, honestly. And I'm not saying that you can't have your identity and your opinions and your independence. I'm not saying that because I believe that if this is a way I feel or I think, whether it's right or wrong, I am entitled to think how I want to think, okay? And I'm entitled to have my own opinion. And I think we should be open and share opinions and, and still be able to communicate respectively to one another even as someone disagrees. I'm not talking about that. I am saying that there is so much abuse that is happening, whether it is in politics, whether it is those who are in leadership, you know, those who are, uh, spiritual leaders, you the parents, you know, as leaders, there's a lot of abuse happening with their children. Like, there is so much abuse happening, and a lot of people think what is abnormal is actually normal, either because maybe they were raised that way, or maybe they've been in an environment like that, or just not having a fully functional brain because of the damage that's been done to it over the years and the trauma that has shaped your way of thinking. And so it's sometimes even hard to see the, the, the toxicity in and the dysfunction that is happening from person to person. And the more we normalize things, you know, it makes it feel okay. And as a matter of fact, if you get a group of people that agree with the dysfunction, then you really feel good about it. But listen, if you take a moment and just step aside from all of the social proof and all of what, you know, the society says is okay and is normal, uh, you know, if you step aside and just independently look at you versus you and look in the mirror and say, I don't care what anybody is doing I don't care if people sit on social media scrolling all day in procrastination. I am supposed to be doing XYZ. I am supposed to have this. This was my intention. This was my dream. This was my goal. This was the thing that I believe I was born to do and to be, and I was born to fix this issue. And now as I look at myself, I am nowhere near where I wanted to be, and I have to figure out why. Why have I gotten to this place, and why has it taken me so long to see that I am in this place of dissatisfaction? And that is when you wake up. At least things will not change overnight, but at least you are able to have the light bulb on. You're able to have that aha moment, and now you're able to take control of the wheel. Because at first, life was dictating where things were going, and you were just reactive. There is no anticipatory response because you are behind the set and you are living in someone else's movie. You're living in someone else's, you know, uh, dream. And you are— obviously, a lot of people are looking at other people's lives. They're more invested in other people's lives than their own life. You know, they know, you know, who the— you know, who this person is and what they got, and you know what just happened to them, and oh, did you hear about this, and oh, did you see this happen on social media, and you know, they're all excited and into the gossip and all the toxic stuff that's going on and everything. And if you ask them, hey, hey, what are you supposed to be doing with your life? What are, what are you supposed to be doing that you're not doing? When were you supposed to do that and what happened? Can you explain why this happened? Can you explain why you are where you are? Can you explain why you haven't made a decision to get your health in order? Have you, have you considered, you know, how much money you got saved up and why you have no savings or you have no money, uh, for, for your, you know, I don't want to say retirement. I don't even like that word anymore, but to, to have a beautiful experience with your grandkids and your great-grandkids, and to leave something for your family, and to, you know, help people out of situations. These things that you desire to do maybe when you were younger and you were dreaming big and nothing was stopping you, and now all of a sudden you're stuck in somebody else's movie and you're looking at everybody else and what they doing and how much money they got and what they— what you don't have because of what they do have, and you're all wrapped up in the wrong thing, we have to break out because life is taking many people from one toxic event to the next toxic event, and they don't even realize they on a subconscious cycle and have no clarity or no awareness of what is happening in their life. And worse than that, they can't do anything about it and the future is very much so predictable. I can look at people and know what they're gonna do and what they're not gonna do based off of the everyday decisions that they're making. You know, there's some things, uh, that have been studied over time that can kind of predict the type of personality that a person has. For example, and it's very, very different, but for example, people who make their beds up. There's a predictability with the behavior patterns of people who get up in the morning and make their bed up right away versus those who get up in the morning, uh, they go to the bathroom or do whatever they're going to do and they'll come back 10 minutes later and then make their bed up. And then the third pattern would be the people who just don't make their bed up at all. They decide, my I don't need to make my bed up. I live by myself, ain't nobody here, or whatever that looks like. Those simple 3 patterns of behavior and the differential, uh, outlets that, that each person go about in context to making up their bed can say a lot about how they respond to life and their relationships. Believe it or not, there's a— it was a study done And I don't remember all the way, but I do remember that the ones who make their bed up right away are less likely to procrastinate on things that they know they should be doing. The ones who, you know, wake up, maybe I think it's they lay in bed for a little bit of time and, you know, uh, then they'll get up, do some things, and then they come back to it when they're ready, uh, they're likely to to, you know, procrastinate a little bit more, put things off, not do things that they should be doing when they should be doing it. And then the third one, the ones who actually get up and just don't feel a need to make up their bed because they live life on their terms, they are likely to sabotage a lot of relationships because their outlook on life is that I don't need a relationship, you know, I do what I want. I'm not here to accommodate you. I, I, I live on my own terms, so I'm not likely to be a good team player with someone else because I, I just— I live at the beat of my own, you know, drums, and, and I'm, I'm pretty distant from anything else that needs to be done, or, you know, any time that needs to be spent with somebody. Now, I'm not just— I'm not saying that this is all like 100% or anything. These are like these are like higher risk predictability to— this is probably how they're treating relationships. And they've saw some connections with how that, that third behavior, their relationships are affected. And maybe even the person whose relationships are affected may not even know why, why they're affected. And no, it's not affected just because they're not making up their bed. Of course we know that they're affected because because that is a pattern of how they treat certain things that they don't really know that they're treating it that way, and it just manifests. And so, so this study is a manifestation of how a person is in life put on, you know, making up their bed, for example. And so here's what I want to say about that, is that what you really need to understand and have wisdom in for yourself is that how you do one thing is how you do anything. And so if you are a person who says, yeah, I'm gonna do this, or I'm gonna do that, and you don't keep your word, don't think that you just didn't keep your word to this moment because, oh, that's, you know, not important. And you, you put it— you put the blame on the outside world. Like that's not important. So that's why I didn't keep my word. And I'm not saying everybody, you don't have a, a option to go back on your word or to say, hey, I'm sorry, or— but communicate. Let's communicate. Because when you put it on the outside world, then what you're saying is that it's their fault that I'm this way, and you're not taking any responsibility. So if you're gonna not keep your word, at be accountable and take responsibility. Don't start blaming people. But like I said, when we are procrastinators, that's what we tend to do because that is what makes us feel good. It all connects. Listen, and so because you do, you know, those little moments of like, oh, I, you know, they don't, you know, it's not that important or whatever, what you don't realize is you do that with everything. You do that with everything. You say you're gonna go to the gym tomorrow, or you're gonna do it later. Uh, you don't have the energy, you don't have the money to invest in yourself to get your health together, you know. Um, you're gonna find a reason to blame something or somebody for what it is that you lack. And you have to look at the small things. Because if you can't identify the small things, how in the world will you identify the large things? See, and that's where we go wrong, because we look at other people and we see the big things, right? And we like, oh, I ain't that bad, I'm not doing that. No, no, no, no, you just ain't recognized it yet because you are living subconsciously in everything that you do, and you have not taken the time to really scrutinize yourself. And you have not taken a time to have self-regulation over your procrastination triggers, because there are triggers that happen that make you do that. You have not categorized your delays and you have not identified the triggers that is making you stay in the cycle. And actually, it may be a relief to see other people who are doing worse because that makes you feel better about yourself. But it is the small things that you must pay attention to, because how you do one thing is how you do everything. And so it's time to have some preset intentions on everything that you're supposed to be doing. And no, I'm not saying that there isn't a cause for a reason why you do have to really delay something, but really what I will say is the only cause for that is if you have a priority priority that is much more important— and I'm not talking about you made it much more important, I mean when you set the date it was more important. Like, something winds up happening to my kids and I was supposed to record a podcast, like, that is important. I can't, I can't just say, well, I don't want to procrastinate with this podcast, so I, you know, I'm going to, uh, you know, let them manage whatever little emergency they have. I can't do that. Now we know that because they are a set priority. Even before this. But I'm not gonna all of a sudden, you know, be on my way to say I'm gonna do something and then I make something else a priority to get out of doing this to make myself feel relieved about it, okay? And trust me, when you are recording videos and doing work and the stuff that you have to do, there are many things that get in the way that give you almost like an escape goat or relief. But I really work hard against that because because if I set myself to do something and all of these things start coming up, I start to recognize the pattern that it's something in me that's trying to push this off. And I just take a minute to say, why? What is it? And a lot of times it is that, that thing about perfection is that we don't— we don't— if we don't feel like we're perfectly ready to do things, then all of a sudden we don't want to do them. But I'm here to tell you that failure is actually a part of success. We all fail forward, and we, we take steps and we get there, but it's— there's going to be some failure that's involved. There's— you're going to fall down, and if you're not falling down, then you're not, you're not trying hard enough, or you're not doing enough. You know, if you are learning how to skate and you want to learn how to do the flips and the turns and all of that, whether you're an ice skater or just a regular skater, if you don't fall, you're not taking any risk. You're not trying to twirl and do all of the stuff that they do. Um, you'll never see a skater, a professional skater, not fall, like practicing and stuff. You're not going to see a baby try to walk and never fall. Like, you have to fall. And so if you already know in your heart, like, it's okay to fall because I may have to get to the 5th try to move forward, but if you already know that, like, it's gonna take 5 times for me move forward, then wouldn't you just go ahead and start anyway? Because if you don't, you're not going to get to experience what you really want to experience in life. And remember, that's the regret of omission. That is the regret of, man, I wish I would have at least tried. I, I didn't even do it. And, and that, that stings a lot. Trust me, you would rather do some things and just have some mistakes and then learn from your mistakes. You either win or you learn. And when you learn, you go back and you adjust and you get closer and closer to the mark. Because life is a numbers game. When babies try to walk, it's about how many times they try before they actually get it. If you got one baby and you can only give them one try a day to walk, it's going to take them a, a longer time to learn how to walk. But if you have another baby in this and you tell that baby 'Hey, we're gonna try 20 times a day for you to take your first step,' I guarantee you that that baby is going to go quicker. And the reason why is because they're willing to have more falls. And so don't look at failure as a reason to not move in the things that you need to move in. Look at it as a way of moving forward quicker, is that you just embrace Hey, I'ma jump in. I'm gonna jump in and see what happens, and we're just gonna move from there. And I'm gonna learn a lot about myself because there's a lot about me that I don't know. And what you want to do is have a positive, healthy rapport with who you are as an individual. You need to know some things about yourself. As a matter of fact, the best way to really have success in life is self-mastery. But the problem is a lot of people don't know themselves. They are living from inside the bottle, and you can't read the label from inside the bottle. They don't have enough accountability. They don't have enough people allowing, uh, uh, you know, the space to be able to help them to move forward. That's why I absolutely love coaching, because coaching helps people to see their blind spots. You don't see your own blind spots. You're not— you're inside your own brain. You you don't see what, what, what is inside your own brain in a sense. You, you know, and even a lot of times when you do identify something is off, you know, again, our self-defense mechanisms kick into place and we start to justify the behaviors that we have. And it's not until we actually, you know, maybe sometimes see a therapist or a counselor or somebody who sit down and say, hey, did you know that this is this way or that is that way? It's always been there. You just finally got to a place where you're willing to let somebody assess you and help you to understand that you have sabotaging behavior patterns that are stopping you from living the most fulfilling, high-quality life that you could possibly live. And one day you're gonna look up and it's— you're gonna be out of time and you're gonna regret all of the things that you could have done that you didn't do just because you didn't want to take a step forward and look like a fool, I guess, you know. But listen, we all got to take the step and we all got to take the leaps when we try to move forward in something. And I'm saying this because usually that's really the bigger picture, is that whatever these little action items are that you're not doing, a lot of times it is just that fear that's somewhere underneath the layers. And the small little things that we do that we don't think it, it matters, it's just a manifestation of, again, the deeper-rooted seated issues that's deep within. And it's just making you perform like this on on little small levels also. But like I said, if we catch the small stuff and we say to ourselves, hey, why am I doing this? Hmm, this tells me a lot about myself. Hmm, why did I get triggered by that? Why did I, you know, get upset by this? You know, we got to remember, triggers are— they— if you look at a gun, the trigger on a gun is very, very small. And the only reason why that gun makes a lot of impact is because of the person who pulls the trigger for the ammo. So what you got to realize is that the trigger is small. It's the response, it's when you pull the trigger that makes that big bang. And so the triggers are these outside circumstances, but how you respond to it— are you resentful about the response? Are you, you know, saying, why did I think that? You know, like, are you saying it in a way where I shouldn't think that? And now you're upset at yourself. And that's another thing for you to you know, uh, you know, soaking in is that I got a problem. And instead of identifying it with a positive reaction, you go into more learned helplessness and more pity for yourself. And it just keeps you in this, this little rut of not taking accountability. But instead, if you step back and you say it almost like this, like, hmm, that's interesting, what made me feel like that? 'Why am I so stressed? Let me figure this thing out.' That's kind of the response that you should have. A lot of people, even if they say the same thing, it's with a different intention. It's with this, this anger, like, 'Oh, why did I do that?' And, and even a lot of people who make bad decisions, they get so mad at themselves that they block themselves again from the responsibility. It's just like when people wind up, you know, committing suicide after killing somebody else. So they done killed somebody else and took somebody else's life, and now they so mad at themselves that they gonna take their life. First of all, why you didn't figure this out before you decided to take somebody else's life? Okay, like, why didn't you understand that you had some issues before you pulled that trigger? You mean you're gonna pull the trigger, take somebody else's life, and now somebody gotta sacrifice their life to make you find out how horrible of a person you are? And then when you find out, you kill yourself and leave yourself with no accountability for the pain that you just caused somebody else's, uh, family and, and those who they love? It doesn't make any sense. And this is the cycle. I know that's an extreme example, but this is the type of cycle that we live in. Even when we do do something, is we have a lot of pity on ourselves, and we have a lot of shame, and it doesn't make us come out of that. It actually makes us stay in that hole, and that, you know, and people going to depression and all this other stuff. But all we need to do is just take a moment. Yes, we're not perfect human beings. When we're not perfect, when we're not doing things right, that's okay. We're all human. But take a moment back and start to question these things. Do not walk around with a dysfunctional psyche and, and toxic levels of thinking patterns and not assess what's going on. If your behavior is as it is, it is a result of your thinking, because as a man thinketh, so is he. So if you are doing things that do not reflect a, a positive outcome or levels of success that you desire, or the dream that you once had. They understand that there's a pattern of thinking, there's something that's happening within your assessment of even who you are that needs to be fixed. And so I want to really shine light on this because we have to almost make some, some, some clear intentions, and we have to set some, some pre-decisions at this point of our life if we want to come out of the cycle of where we've been. And I felt that this was really necessary because we're all entangled in it from time to time. We all have these experiences from time to time. This is a, a known thing for a lot of people, and if we just recognize it, we'll see just how much our world will come together and how much more fulfilling our life would be if we go into a season of pattern recognition, utilization, and creation to be able to solve this issue and get ourselves on the path that we really want to be on. Because at the end of the day, we're really going to find a lot of joy in doing what we are supposed to do. This is always about growth. This is always about personal development. And if you're not growing, then I don't know what you're doing. Like, I, I, I don't know what you're doing if you're not growing, because life is about growth. You're not experiencing life, you're not living. If you're not growing, you're not living. And, and we, we're here to learn and to absorb the understanding of what it is that makes life so precious. And if we don't get a chance to encounter that, you know, then it's, it's almost like on your grave it can just read, "As if you were never here." Because you are here for a reason and for a purpose, and you don't want to exit out with that type of, uh, aura around your entire life. And, and a lot of people people have been that way. And you know what the greatest devastation has been? What I hear people say often is that they wish they could have had better relationships. That's usually what, what people say on their deathbed. And that, that's usually the, the guilt and the shame and the regret that happens. And usually that's not like— that's not always about I did this relationship wrong. It's about relationships that they should have had that they didn't like parents with their children, for example, you know, working too much or getting so involved in everything else that you miss out on your children's lives. You know, you didn't make it to their games, you didn't, you know, go on vacations and have happy moments and experiences, or you didn't invest in the friendships that you needed to invest in. That is important. That is life. Life is relationships, and relationships are the currency of the kingdom., and we need to know that so that we don't find ourselves in a miserable place at the end of our days. It's nothing like that feeling. So if you can fast forward and understand that that is the feeling that a lot of people have and that you don't want to have, then it will push you into now being very, very, very intentional. About dealing with this psychological issue of procrastination. Procrastination could be ruining your entire life. It could be ruining your finances. It could be ruining your relationships. It could be ruining your dreams and all the wonderful things that you were born to do and to be. And I hope that this was eye-opening enough for you to understand even the misconceptions of what should be allowed for your life and what should not be. And this isn't about trying to figure out what everybody else is doing. This isn't about trying to make yourself feel better or worse for what has been. This is about being aware and living in a way that you can consciously make decisions that you know will change the outcome of your life and your future. And the more you do that, the less effort and willpower it would take, because once you are in a subconscious autopilot type mode, you don't have to think about things anymore. One of the things that we do on autopilot all the time is we wake up and we get in the shower and we brush our teeth That's not something you got to think about. That you don't need willpower to brush your teeth in the morning. It is something that is a part of you and your routine and your day, and it's not hard. If you ever ask somebody, is it hard to wake up and brush your teeth every day, they're not going to say, oh, it's just so dreadful that I have to wake up and do that every day. I gotta pump myself up and motivate myself every single day to get that toothbrush and put that, you know, toothpaste on the toothbrush. Oh, it gets exhausting trying to figure out 'What kind of toothpaste to have, and I gotta buy it every, you know, a week or whatever.' You don't have that issue. It is a part of your life and a part of your world, and you don't even think about it. As a matter of fact, even though I just mentioned that, you probably haven't thought about brushing your teeth in a very long time. You just do it. You don't have to think about it. You just do it. Just do it. I like that. That's what Nike says, and they got a— they got a great statement right there. Because this is not about trying or, or any of that. This is about doing it. Procrastination will make you think you tried to do something. No, no, no, you don't try. You either do it or you don't do it. So what are the things that you want to do for your life? Set that stage, set that expectation. And move forward in the very things that you know that you are supposed to be a part of in this world. Now, as I exit out, I want to remind you to please make sure that you subscribe to my podcast show. Don't miss out on the notifications and the amazing things that we're going to talk about and discover. And please, if you have any ideas, or if you have any questions, or any suggestions of topics that you really want me to talk about about. I will do that for you. I want to hear what you got to say because this is something that we're doing together, and it is important for me to make sure that I am helping you on your health journey. And so I want to hear what you have to say. Put it in the comments, leave it, let me know what it is that you would like me to share and to talk about. It has been a pleasure. I'm Kamilah Stevenson, and this has been an episode of Health Gold.