Is Procrastination Stealing Your Joy?

Even though I am a Bible Teacher, Preacher, and international speaker, I have a tough time getting started with writing. To boost my motivation to write more often and more boldly, I recently took a writing course. I learned a lot about myself: I am a procrastinator. I am a bit of a perfectionist. I take a long time to process things if I lack confidence. I feel so guilty when I realize I've wasted so much time getting started. But I do very well when I do get started and follow a plan until I finish the project.

Here's the bottom line: Procrastination is a joy-buster.

You need a Strategy for busting procrastination, so you can stop busting your joy!

(1) Develop a plan. Start with: due date, purpose, goals, use headings and bullets.

(2) Carve out regular, small amounts of time to work on your project.

(3) Just start, even if you don't feel like it or know what to do. The goal is to begin.

(4) Edit your work later. Work on the big ideas and drill down as you go along.

(5) Don't give up. Finish what you start because quitters never finish.

Take back your joy! Making regular progress leads to timely project completion.

Below is the first assignment I completed in the writing course (it's unedited).

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What do you think? Are you a procrastinator as well?

My Personal Writing Exercise: Write for 20 minutes about a childhood tree.

My Childhood Tree.

When I was 9 years old, my family and I moved to Portmore, Jamaica. My mom, stepdad, my brother, and I moved to our own house. The apartment we were living in before was a ground floor room connected to others. There was a tree in the yard. It was an ackee tree that spirits seemed to live in because my mom rebuked them on several occasions when we were coming home from church late at night.

At this new house, we had a tree. It was a mango tree. It was a Julie mango tree. I don’t know who planted it because none of the other houses on our block had a fruit tree. The tree is significant because it became so prominent in the neighbourhood that people would know us by the tree in our front yard. I specifically remember green mangoes on the tree. I remember because people would pass by and ask about ripe mangoes but a lot of the time when I looked up at the branches from close to the room near the tree, there were only green mangoes.

Eventually, ripe mangoes started to appear. My neighbours would frequently look over to see if we had any ripe mangoes. The mangoes became a conversation starter for boys that wanted to get my attention. Any boy I liked I would try to find and give him a ripe mango. Any boys that didn’t appeal to me there would be no ripe mangoes for them.

The tree became so large that it overtook the entire front yard of our house. We had enough room to pass on a small path, but that was it. My stepdad didn’t want to cut it down and he was not keen on pruning the large stems and branches that protruded into the public walkway.

Julie mangoes are the sweetest mango species that I have ever tasted. The green or unripe mangoes are crunchy and sour. They can be eaten with salt or sugar, depending on what a person is craving. Most people eat green mangoes by cutting them into small pieces and then dipping the pieces into sugar or salt depending on person’s desire for that time. Most people bite into their ripe mango. Many have expressed a great satisfaction that comes from biting into a sweet and juicy mango that cannot be duplicated. However, people like me like to cut up ripe Julie mangoes. Although I enjoy the sweetness and juiciness of the mango, I experience a painful sensitivity to my teeth touching the seed. It’s like nails on a chalkboard, so painful that I cannot look at, eat, or think about eating a mango for a day or two. To me, mangoes are a source of great joy if eaten correctly, or a source of great pain if my teeth touch the seed.

Hurricane season was a dangerous time with this tree in our front yard. There were several occasions when I feared for our house. When the winds blew and the tree branches swayed, I wondered if they would fall and destroy the house. That never happened. We lost many branches and lots of mangoes, ripe and green, but the tree stood and our house did too.