Everyone procrastinates. However, for individuals with avoidant personality types procrastination can pose some serious challenges to daily life. Avoidant personality types avoid tasks and responsibilities not just out of laziness, but due to fear of criticism, rejection, or failure. This type of avoidance leads to chronic procrastination, which has a significant negative impact on wellness and productivity. If this sounds like you, don’t freak out! There’s hope to turn this habit around. Let’s explore the most effective procrastination tools proven to work best for avoidant personality types.
Understanding Avoidant Personality Types
Before we begin, let’s confirm our understanding of what it means to have an avoidant personality. People with avoidant personality types often suffer from:
- Fear of rejection and a hypersensitivity to criticism
- Self-doubt
- Behaviors that help avoid any potential discomfort
- Heightened anxiety when faced with inescapable discomfort
Procrastination tools for avoidant personalities
Procrastination helps avoidant personality types cope to deal with hard emotions. While it is an attempt to help themselves, ultimately it only exacerbates the problem. To break free from this self-sabotaging cycle, lean on these procrastination tools:
Meditation
Mindfulness helps you become more aware of your thoughts and feelings without judging yourself. Through consistent meditation, you increase your awareness of your avoidant behaviors and stop procrastination dead in its tracks by acknowledging your triggers. This awareness is the first and most crucial step toward change.
Talk nicer to yourself
If you have an avoidant personality, you probably also have a really negative inner critic. Shut your fearful mind down by killing it with kindness. Positive affirmations remind you of your strengths and potential to dismantle preemptive pessimism.
Take smaller steps
Avoidant behavior comes out when you get overwhelmed. And if its in your personality, it doesn’t take much to overwhelm you. This is when you tend to hand the reigns over to procrastination. Ultimately, it’s how you soothe yourself. Instead, try breaking monumental tasks down into smaller, more manageable ones. This makes the process less intimidating and allows you to focus on completing one step at a time.
Use the two-minute rule
This is a simple concept: if a task takes less than two minutes to complete, do it now. This approach helps get easy tasks off your to-do list quickly and reduces the overall burden of procrastination.
Find an accountability buddy
Share your goals and the daily habits you set to achieve them with someone you trust. I share mine through a habit-tracking app with my best friend. Every few days we check in on each other’s progress and text each other if one of us sees the other is falling off. Having someone to hold you accountable is a powerful tool to avoid procrastination.
Be proactive about time management
Explore time management techniques such as the Pomodoro Technique or time blocking. These methods can help you structure your day to make it easier to tackle your to-do list and maintain focus.
Treat yourself
Implement a rewards system with yourself to reinforce positive behavior. This is how you train your brain to dive into challenges and discomfort rather than avoid them at all costs. Every time you complete a task, treat yourself to something enjoyable, like a snack or a five-minute break.
Conclusion
Procrastination is a universal struggle, but it hits those with avoidant personalities especially hard. The key to overcoming procrastination is to address the root of the underlying fears and negative thought patterns that drive avoidance behavior.
By incorporating mindfulness, positive self-talk, accountability, time management techniques, and rewards into your daily routine, overcoming procrastination IS possible. However, change takes time. Remember to give yourself grace as you try to rewire your procrastinating tendencies.
Which of the above procrastination tools has been working for you?
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