Most of the time, procrastination is easy to spot. However, there is a subtle and very dangerous type of procrastination everyone should be on the lookout for. It looks like productive work, but the result is the same…it keeps you from accomplishing the things you need to accomplish.
This type of procrastination can take several forms, but in the most dangerous one, the victim appears to be involved in good habits of organizing and planning their work. In reality, they are being lured into doing nothing that will actually move them closer to their goals.
To avoid this type of procrastination, you must be alert. When you get the urge to suddenly rearrange your office from productivity, or create a detailed list of everything you need to do for the next 10 years, stop and see if there is some task you are avoiding. Your planning and organization might be beneficial, but make sure it isn’t preventing you from doing what really needs to be done.
Originally published on June 6, 2006.
I found a link to this post on reddit.com and checked it out.
I poked around some of your other posts and thought their were interesting as well.
I like what I’ve read so far but you really should consider an ‘about’ page so visitors have some frame of reference as far as who you are and where you’re coming from.
What happened to this blog? It used to update more than this.
I believe that email is probably the number one culprit when it comes to procrastination in sheep’s clothing.
A name for a milder form of the same difficulty is “productive procrastination.” That’s when you clean your office instead of surf the web, etc.,.