Photo by gingerpig2000
Periods when we are not productive can take several forms and be caused by a number of motivators, both positive and negative. And sometimes those times when we think we’re not getting much done are actually highly fruitful and important.
Sue’s definition of Procrastination:
Compulsively postponing completion of a task to avoid an uncomfortable feeling.
The tell-tale signs are:
- Feeling equally uncomfortable about the avoiding.
- Engaging instead in mindless, low-priority tasks.
- Continually moving the item from one day’s to-do list to the next.
- Believing that if you just buy one more info product or read one more book, you’ll be ready to start.
Procrastination is sometimes confused with its healthier and more creative cousin, Incubation.
Incubation is when an idea isn’t clear to you yet, and your conscious and/or unconscious mind needs time to work on it.
Tell-tale signs of Incubation include:
- Usually follows a period of activity or idea generation.
- A sense of imminence that is exciting if you’re not self-flagellating.
- Often followed by ahas, epiphanies and a sudden burst of action.
Then there’s Floundering.
Floundering is when you don’t know what your next step should be. You’re overwhelmed or missing a key piece of information that would get you unstuck. Your intent is to be productive, but you lack the clarity to make good use of your time.
Tell-tale signs:
- Feeling unclear about where to begin.
- Starting and stopping, having several projects going at once with nothing ever completed.
- Wishing someone would come along to tell you what to do or how to do it.
By far the most dangerous of all types of unproductiveness is Self-Sabotage. In this instance, you are so uncomfortable with your path that you intentionally derail yourself—though you may not be aware that you’re doing that. Most likely, you’ll have very convincing rationalizations for why you need to stop working on something you had initially been excited about.
The tell-tale signs of Self-Sabotage include:
- Coming from a family where you felt you were never good enough.
- Passing up opportunities for success and growth.
- Working enthusiastically until success starts to seem real, and then changing direction.
- Rejecting or fighting attempts from others to give help.
- Disappointing people who might move you forward (showing up late, not returning calls, etc.)
Self-sabotage is a tough one. It rests on years of mental programming, but those scripts can be rewritten with time and support.
Finally, we have the Lull.
Photo by John Mayer
A Lull is a conscious choice to remove yourself from your work in order to rest and recharge your creative batteries.
Tell-tale signs:
- Preceded by an intense or long period of productive activity.
- Feels pleasant and deserved, if you see it for what it is.
- Followed by action…eventually.
You will notice that of the five types of inactivity, only Procrastination, Self-Sabotage and Floundering are something you’d want to remedy. Incubation and Lulls are very positive phases of the creative process and are actually quite productive, though they may not appear that way on the surface.
If you’ve decided you are in fact experiencing Procrastination, Floundering or Self-Sabotage, please be compassionate with yourself. These are very normal responses during the creative process, and even the most accomplished people experience them.
The difference, perhaps, between the high-achieving procrastinator/flounderer/self-saboteur and the one who never gets anywhere lies in their acceptance of their own imperfect humanness and finding ways to work around these tendencies rather than succumb to them.
And if what you’re doing is Incubation or a Lull, remember to give yourself credit for the important work you’re doing behind the scenes and enjoy this special time.
Have you ever felt guilty or down on yourself during a time that you now see as productivity in disguise?
Have you found ways that work for you to break through Procrastination, Self-Sabotage or Floundering?
How is it helpful to distinguish between the different types of inactivity?
Please share in the comments!
Oh, blog post ‘A Field Guide to our unproductive selves’ – how do I love thee? Let me count the ways…
Sue, what a great article you’ve written here. Great new website too! I especially like the ‘tell-tale signs’ in each section as a quick self-evaluation tool. REALLY effective.
I think I’ve had my fair share of time spent as a flounderer. I think what has helped me get past flip-flopping around has been finding someone to hold me accountable and actually making the commitment to ask for help rather than struggling all on my own (and I’m glad I found you and hired you as my coach).
Biting the bullet and making a specific commitment for a few goals and holding yourself accountable to follow through with those is helpful too, because in reality you actually end up making tangible progress overall in a gradual way, despite what it may feel like from day to day. Coming face-to-face with that success or having it communicated in some way to you from an outside source feels validating enough to help you get past the next time you feel bad about floundering around…
I could write a book about the evils of self-sabotage and basically spent most of my life caught in its insidious trap. I think once you want to rid yourself of that mindset, its power or hold on you is diminished significantly. I’m grateful for the reframing techniques you’ve helped me with recently; I would highly recommend them to anyone struggling with the plague of self-sabotage. It’s effective because you can actually re-program your brain so eventually a positive, affirming thought pops up at the same time as that self-sabotaging one. The truth becomes clearer and clearer and the self-sabotaging bully’s voice gets fainter and fainter.
I look forward to spending more time in a lull this summer. That ‘place’ sounds really dreamy!
Carole, you are so right about having support versus struggling on your own. Our inner demons do *not* like the light of day, and sharing them with someone else exposes those evil little saboteurs for what they are!
And yes, this is a great time of year for a Lull! So easy to forget to allow ourselves that time.
Twitter: Sue_Mitchell
thank you for writing and posting this article. what helps me through ‘down’ (unproductive) times is trusting my intuition and body to signal what i need, be it rest or more reading (when i can’t write or i experience floundering). i’m a perfectionist who thinks all-or-nothing: either i do a project perfectly or not at all, which allows me very little joy, a lot of stress (mostly from self-criticism), and very few projects to work on. i know that i must change this self-defeating attitude…and i’m doing something about it by coming up with a list of qualities that i’d be happy to have (e.g., positive, energetic, focused, encouraging, persevering, forgiving, and self-motivated), and every day before i start work, i list down specific actions that i can do that day to practice the particular quality. for example: for positive, i can self-talk positive statements like “I can find a way to solve today’s problems/issues.” and “‘Here and now’ is brimming with accessible inspiration.” For encouraging, i can help my nephew memorize a poem by listening to him and coaching him, so on, and so forth
Yasmin, I love your idea of focusing on qualities you want to have and purposely working them into your day. It’s so important for us perfectionists to give ourselves credit for all we do RIGHT–which, in most cases, is a lot!
It’s also great that you recognize all-or-nothing thinking as the root of perfectionism. The truth is almost always somewhere in the middle!
Twitter: Sue_Mitchell
Sue,
This is great stuff!
I never realized that there are so many levels of unproductivity – not just procrastination.
What I have done is that I have tried to remove as much less important things on my life as possible and just focus on important ones.
For example, I’m building my online business on the side (I have a day job). Every time I would like to procrastinate on that, I remind myself that the longer it is going to take me to switch to running my business full-time if I procrastinate.
Timo
Timo Kiander recently posted..The Most Important Ingredient Of Any Productivity System
Twitter: ProductiveSd
Hi, Timo! Like you, I also have a job (part-time) in addition to being self-employed. Sometimes I think it may actually help my productivity because of the pressure it puts on me to make the most of the limited time I have. Work expands to fill the time available, right? It’s so easy to squander hours at a time by lack of planning and focus.
At the same time, it’s important to look at the underlying reasons we’re not working. This relates to the principle you mention in the bio box on your home page, that the success of your business is dependent on your own personal development. Someone who is floundering or in self-sabotage, for example, won’t use productivity tools they know are effective because they have inner work to do first.
Thanks for stopping by! I’m looking forward to exploring your site.
Twitter: Sue_Mitchell
Sue,
I agree.
Because I have little time available for my own projects, I have to find creative ways to maximize my time and just cut off everything extra activity.
Timo
Timo Kiander recently posted..The Most Important Ingredient Of Any Productivity System
Twitter: ProductiveSd
Sue, I am back here reading this post for the 5th or 6th time and I have forwarded it to others. I’m a little late getting to this week’s Creative Juice Prompt about allowing “lull” where you include a link back to this post.
These catagories really help prompt me to discover what’s going on so I can go about it more compassionately. I love the incubation and lull spots.