Procrastination is about emotions, not time management

Procrastination is putting off something you’ve decided to do, even though you know that waiting will only make things worse. It looks like a problem with time management or discipline, but research points in a different direction: it is, at its core, a way of coping with emotions. The task triggers something unpleasant — boredom, uncertainty, fear of failure — and putting it off makes that discomfort disappear straight away. Your phone makes that escape easier than it has ever been.

It’s not laziness

A lazy person doesn’t want to do anything. Someone who procrastinates often wants to do the task, feels bad about not doing it, and yet spends time on something else anyway. It’s a completely different problem.

Psychologist Piers Steel reviewed hundreds of studies on procrastination in a major meta-analysis. One of the clearest links he found was with impulsivity: people who are quick to act on whatever appeals to them right now are also quick to put off what will only pay off later. The reward for the task lies in the future, but the discomfort lies in the present, and the present wins out.

Mood repair on credit

Fuschia Sirois and Timothy Pychyl describe procrastination as short-term mood repair. You open the document, feel a slight sense of discomfort, and switch to something that feels better. The discomfort disappears immediately. It’s a real relief, and that’s why the behaviour is reinforced.

The price is paid by your future self. The task remains, time has run out, and the next time you open the document, the discomfort is greater — so the urge to escape is also greater. It’s a cycle that grows with every turn.

That’s also why more motivation rarely solves the problem. Motivation is a feeling, and those who procrastinate already have problems with emotions. Anyone who wants to know why motivation tends to let you down when you need it most can read the article on why motivation isn’t enough.

Your phone is the nearest escape route

In the past, it took a certain amount of effort to procrastinate. You had to get up, find something else to do, perhaps go somewhere. Now, escape lies a decimetre from your hand. One unpleasant paragraph, and your thumb has already opened a feed.

This means that procrastination and phone habits reinforce each other. Every time your phone takes away a feeling of discomfort, it teaches you that it’s the way out. And every switch from the task to the phone and back leaves behind a residue of attention, making it even harder to get back into the task — something described in more detail in the article on screens and concentration.

Forgive yourself for last time

One of the more unexpected findings in the research comes from Michael Wohl, Timothy Pychyl and Shannon Bennett. They studied students who had been procrastinating ahead of an exam. Those who forgave themselves for putting off their revision procrastinated less ahead of the next exam than those who continued to be hard on themselves.

The explanation is consistent with the emotion model: self-criticism is yet another source of discomfort linked to the task. The more shame you carry with you into the next attempt, the stronger the urge to escape becomes. Forgiving yourself does not lower your standards. It removes some of what makes the task difficult to get started on.

Make the task less unpleasant, not yourself harder on yourself

If procrastination is an emotional problem, the solution is to reduce the discomfort at the start, not to put more pressure on yourself.

Make the first step ridiculously small. Not ‘write the report’, but ‘open the document and write one sentence’. The discomfort usually lies in getting started, and once you’ve got going, you often carry on.

Remove the escape route before you start. Put your phone in another room whilst you’re working. You don’t need to resist an exit that isn’t there.

Put the feeling into words. When you notice you’re about to run away, ask yourself how the task makes you feel. Being able to say “this feels uncertain” makes the feeling easier to bear.

Decide when and where. “At nine o’clock, at the kitchen table, I’ll start with the first paragraph” is easier to stick to than “I’ll get round to it tomorrow”. The same principle underpins the whole model for breaking a habit.

When it’s something else

Almost all research into procrastination has been carried out on students, and most of it concerns everyday procrastination. If, over a long period, you’re unable to get started on anything at all, if this is accompanied by low mood, or if it’s seriously affecting your work and relationships, there may be other explanations, such as depression or ADHD. This cannot be determined from an article alone — speak to a healthcare professional.

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The Zenith Protocol is a 30-day programme for impulse control, built around small daily steps rather than grand resolutions. It’s free to get started.