In Rational Emotive Behavior Therapy, we help people overcome their self-defeating tendency to procrastinate, also known as avoidance behavior. Nearly all humans do some procrastinating at some point in their lives. This avoidance is probably because all humans have a strong predisposition to remain comfortable in the short run and an inclination to rate themselves globally based on how well they perform important activities and down themselves when they perform poorly. REBT theory posits that these are biological predispositions that all humans have to push against to a greater or lesser extent. Both of these predispositions often lead to procrastination. Although all humans may procrastinate to a greater or lesser extent, it does not logically follow in thinking that we absolutely should not have to work to minimize or eliminate this self-defeating tendency. Humans learn by doing, and we fail to remember this fact of human nature when we avoid doing something which we may be unfamiliar with or find arduous to do. When we procrastinate, we tend to increase the stress we feel because there are consequences to avoiding a task that has value in completing. We have less time to get the job completed, and we are aware of this loss of time, which tends to make taking action sooner rather than later all the more critical. The first step in using REBT to overcome procrastination is to see what emotion you are avoiding and keep you from engaging with the task.
To help yourself overcome procrastination, you need to imagine yourself doing a specific task. You need to imagine a specific task or situation and not attempt to address procrastination with a vague examination. If you do this imagery exercise, you will become aware of the negative emotions you would experience and avoid. Identifying these uncomfortable feelings is essential. The feelings you will typically feel in this exercise are depression, anxiety, anger, or shame. Using the REBT ABC model, once you imagine engaging with the avoided task and have identified your unhealthy C (Consequential feeling), you can then determine the possible Adversities at point A that you are likely to be avoiding. Below you will find the typical themes of the Adversities people procrastinate about:
Typical Unhealthy Feelings at C in Procrastination:
Depression: a possible failure or anticipated loss when you engage with the avoided task
Anxiety: a threat to your self-esteem or threat to your state of comfort when you engage with the avoided task
Anger or Resentment: a sense of the loss of personal freedom imposed upon you when you engage with the avoided task
Shame: falling short of your ideal when you engage with the task and believing you may be looked down upon by others for falling short
In REBT, once you have identified the Adversity at A and the Unhealthy feeling at C, you can then look for the rigid and extreme attitudes that mainly cause you to procrastinate.
A representative list of self-defeating attitudes at point B, which lead to procrastination are:
- I must do the task ideally well.
- I must not fall short of an ideal in executing the task.
- I must not lose at this competitive task. I would be lesser as a person if I competed and lost.
- If I do not do well when I engage with the task, that would mean I am lesser of a human or worthless as a human.
- I must be able to do the task comfortably to do the task.
- I must not experience discomfort while engaging in the task.
- I must not experience emotional disturbance and have to address it to eliminate my avoidance of a challenging task.
- I must only feel positive feelings while doing the task.
- It is too difficult or too uncomfortable to do the task now.
- I should not be made to do this task by others or circumstances.
- I must not be observed by others acting incompetently during the execution of the task.
- It would be awful if I am looked down upon by others in executing the task in a less than an ideal manner.
To use REBT effectively to overcome your tendency to procrastinate, you need to identify words that resonate with you when you identify the attitude that underpins your avoidance behavior. REBT does not “click” unless you find the right words to capture the attitude that is linked to the specific feeling motivating you to avoid. Specifying your thoughts and feelings is essential, and it is for this reason writing about the causes of procrastination can result in so many attitudes. Now we will take each of the attitudes specified above and challenge them and create healthier action-oriented attitudes.
1.I must do the task ideally well.
Disputing question: Where is the evidence that I must do the task ideally well? What is the impact on my behavior if I hold this attitude towards this task?
Answer and Action-Oriented Alternative Attitude: There is no evidence I must do the task ideally well. As I do it imperfectly well, I will feel discomfort, but I can bear that. By holding this attitude, I am preventing myself from doing the task. Humans learn by doing and re-doing. By procrastinating, I learn nothing and will not have time to do the task over. I want to do the task ideally well but do not have to do so. The universe permits fallible humans to do important tasks imperfectly well. I will try my best and accept the outcome of my efforts. If time permits, I can try to do it a second time and capitalize on the initial attempt to do the task. Take action now. You will learn a great deal by doing the task. Learn by doing is the way to go!
2. I must not fall short of an ideal in executing the task.
Disputing questions: Will your rigid idealism keep you from attempting the task? Is there evidence that you must not fall short of the ideal execution of the task?
Answer and Action-Oriented Alternative Attitude: My rigid idealism will hold me back from attempting the task. Idealistic attitudes do not work in the real world. When we fail to try to do something, we fail to learn how to do it. There is no evidence the task has to be done ideally well. I will get closer to an ideal performance in the future if I permit myself to do the task less than ideally today.
3. I must not lose at this competitive task. I would be lesser as a person if I competed and lost.
Disputing questions: Although it is desirable that you compete and prevail, why must you? How would losing make you lesser of a person?
Answer and Action-Oriented Alternative Attitude: Because it is desirable to win, that is why I like to win but do not have to prevail. I can enter the competition and try my best, and if I lose, I could accept losing and accept myself. I would be a person who lost the competition, not a loser. If I do not stop procrastinating, I will be a person who avoids competition, but that too would not make me a loser. Losers and people with less human value do not exist. They are made up constructs in my head that keep me from trying to do difficult tasks. What does exist are fallible humans, some of whom avoid competition and some of whom compete. Check your ego at the door and jump in and compete.
4. If I do not do well when I engage with the task, that would mean I am lesser of a human or worthless as a human.
Disputing question: Doing well has its advantages, but how is it that not doing well diminishes your human worth or makes you worthless?
Answer and Action-Oriented Alternative Attitude: I want to do well but do not have to do well. If I do not do well, it proves I am a fallible human, not lesser of a human or worthless. Since I want to do well, I would be well advised to stop avoiding the task and push myself to do it as well as I can at this point. The more often I do the task, the more likely I will do well at the task. I will take my ego out of the performance to eliminate my procrastination.
5. I must be able to do the task comfortably to do the task.
Disputing questions: Are there other tasks you do uncomfortably? Although it is preferable to do the task comfortably, is this an absolute requirement?
Answer and Action-Oriented Alternative Attitude: When I think about it, I do other things in various states of comfort. It is preferable to be comfortable while doing a task but not a necessity. If I think of comfort as a prerequisite for action, I will not do much in life. There will be an enormous practical loss if I avoid it due to a demand to be comfortable while doing a task. A variant of this self-defeating attitude is that I have to feel inclined to do something to do it. This reasoning is false to the facts. I can do something because it is the right time to do it, even if I am not inclined to do it. Much of adult living is doing things that are best to do at the right moment because of the benefits of doing so in the end.
6. I must not experience discomfort while engaging in the task.
Disputing question: Although it would be ideal to experience comfort while doing the task, is this an absolute necessity before doing the task?
Answer and Action-Oriented Alternative Attitude: It is only preferable that I experience comfort while doing the task, but I can do the task even if I experience discomfort. To assume that to do something, I have to be comfortable doing it is entirely false to the facts. I can call to mind numerous things I had done in my life when it was a good time to do them and did not feel inclined to do them. Much of adult living is doing tasks when it is best to do them to avoid unwanted consequences.
7. I must not experience emotional disturbance and address it to eliminate my avoidance of a challenging task.
Disputing questions: Even though it is desirable, why must I not have to clear away emotional disturbance when preparing myself to do a challenging task?
Answer and Action-Oriented Alternative Attitude: There is no evidence that I must not have to clear away emotional disturbance to prepare myself to do a challenging task. I am a fallible human, and my procrastinating tendencies will require that I address them in order to get myself going. It would be better if I did not have to think about my thinking and correct it to engage with a task, but I am human. I will accept myself and do what I need to do to get myself going.
8. I must only feel positive feelings while doing this task.
Disputing questions: What is the impact this idealistic attitude has on my functioning? What would be a more mature and realistic attitude to hold?
Answer and Action-Oriented Alternative Attitude: I wish I only felt positive feelings when doing this task, but this is a very unrealistic and self-defeating attitude to hold. There will be positive feelings upon completion of the work, and there may be uncomfortable or negative feelings before starting the task and while doing it. I will bear those feelings and choose to bear them because, in the end, I want to get the task behind me. Doing so will make me feel good in the long run!
9. It is too difficult or too uncomfortable to do the task now.
Disputing questions: Which position does the evidence support – that it is too difficult or too uncomfortable to do the task now, or is it undesirably difficult and undesirably uncomfortable to do the task now?
Answer and Action-Oriented Alternative Attitude: All evidence shows that doing the task now is difficult and uncomfortable but not too difficult or uncomfortable to do now. If someone offered me a large sum of money to do it now, I would immediately do it, which suggests I am choosing not to do it instead of the task being inherently too difficult and too uncomfortable to do now. I will acknowledge the value in doing the task, and because it has value, I will bear the difficulty and discomfort and choose to do it now. Let me whine less and push myself to take action!
10. I should not be made to do this task by others or circumstances.
Disputing questions: Is it that you are being made to do the task or choosing to do the task? Why must there not be consequences to action or inaction?
Answer and Action-Oriented Alternative Attitude: I will choose to do the task because I accept that in life there are consequences to action and inaction. I will choose what consequences I will face. The real world is a series of facing consequences. In a utopia, I would not be made to do anything, but that is not the world I live in and will do better if I accept life as it is and then do what I can to determine my destiny to the best of my ability.
11. I must not be observed by others acting incompetently during the execution of the task.
Disputing question: Do you think there is a law of the universe, like the law of gravity, that compels conditions to be such that you are only observed by others when acting competently?
Answer and Action-Oriented Alternative Attitude: Even though I would like always to be observed by others when acting competently, it does not have to be so. I will accept that others may see me perform a task incompetently, which is how life goes. Because I choose to accept myself unconditionally, acting incompetently is emotionally easier to bear even if others witness my incompetent behavior.
12. It would be awful if I am looked down upon by others in executing the task in a less than ideal manner.
Disputing questions: What does awful really mean? Is it very bad if others look down upon you when you perform a task in a less than ideal manner, or is it awful?
Answer and Action-Oriented Alternative Attitude: It is good to want others to look upon you favorably, but it is not an absolute necessity to do a task. We all want to be seen doing things in an ideal way but thinking it awful to be seen doing something in less than an ideal manner will hold you back in life. Keep your desire to be approved by others but do not make it necessary and enslave yourself to performing ideally. Yes, it is good to be seen by others performing well, but it is far from awful, terrible or the end of the world for others to look down upon you when you complete a task in a less than ideal manner.
Fallible humans like to be comfortable and to do things that only feel good when doing, which are then interpreted as easy to do. We also block ourselves from action by demanding that we do important things perfectly well. All humans do some procrastinating behaviors from time to time. REBT provides you with a useful way of first understanding the avoidance mechanism and then how to change your avoidance behavior. When you observe yourself procrastinating, you had better acknowledge it and accept yourself even though you are making things worse by avoiding doing specific tasks. However, do not use self-acceptance as an excuse for continuing to procrastinate. That is a misuse of a helpful idea. Then go back to the basic theory of REBT and use the ABC model to overcome your procrastination. Even with the action-oriented, self-helping attitudes, I specified above, you had better brace yourself for a fight. We humans defeat our ends, and procrastination is one example of this human tendency. Push yourself to adopt and act upon the action-oriented attitudes found above. Push, push, push yourself to act upon these healthy attitudes. Keep after yourself. You cannot perfect yourself with REBT, but if you work at REBT thinking, you can reduce your procrastination and do better at life. Better is better. Keep after yourself.
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