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Self-proclaimed 'master procrastinator' takes us on a tour of his mind. It's so relatable.

The war between "Instant Gratification Monkey" and "The Panic Monster" is real.

Credit: TED/YouTube

Tim Urban giving his "Inside the Mind of a Master Procrastinator" TED Talk in 2016

Procrastination is a common but baffling phenomenon that doesn't make logical sense but most of us engage in to some degree. We know we need to do something that we don't really feel like doing, so we put it off until we have no choice but to hustle and get it done.

But some of us are habitual procrastinators to the point where we put off things we desperately don't want to procrastinate on. Unless it's something fun or super interesting, a task will get delayed until the last minute, when our panic causes a superhuman ability to kick in that enables us to complete the task in record time. Then we kick ourselves for creating so much stress over procrastinating something that we could have simply done earlier.

One such "master procrastinator," Tim Urban, gave us a glimpse inside his mind with an entertaining and oh-so-relatable TED Talk. Using rudimentary illustrations, self-deprecating humor and characters like Rational Decision-Maker, Instant Gratification Monkey and The Panic Monster, Urban demonstrates what happens in a procrastinator's brain at every point in the process.

Watch:

- YouTubewww.youtube.com

Urban begins by explaining how he wrote papers in college, not gradually doing a little work on it each day but rather doing it all right before it's due. But then he had a 90-page thesis to write, which should take a year. Theoretically, you would do a little at a time, building up over the course of the school year with a bigger push toward the end. But Urban kept struggling to get started, pushing his plan further and further, until he had only three days to get it done.

"And so I did the only thing I could," he said. "I wrote 90 pages over 72 hours, pulling not one but two all-nighters—humans are not supposed to pull two all-nighters—sprinted across campus, dove in slow motion and got it in just at the deadline."

Spoiler: It wasn't good.

The three characters that live in the mind of a procrastinator

Now a writer and blogger, Urban wanted to explain to non-procrastinators what happens in the brain of a procrastinator. He showed that a normal person's brain has a Rational Decision-Maker at the helm, whereas a procrastinator has both a Rational Decision-Maker and an Instant Gratification Monkey. When the Decision-Maker makes the rational decision that it's time to get some work done, Instant Gratification Monkey resists.

"He actually takes the wheel, and he says, 'Actually, let's read the entire Wikipedia page of the Nancy Kerrigan/ Tonya Harding scandal,because I just remembered that that happened,'" Urban says. "'Then we're going to go over to the fridge to see if there's anything new in there since 10 minutes ago. After that, we're going to go on a YouTube spiral that starts with videos of Richard Feynman talking about magnets and ends much, much later with us watching interviews with Justin Bieber's mom. All of that's going to take a while, so we're not going to really have room on the schedule for any work today. Sorry!'"

media.giphy.com

He explains that the monkey is only interested in two things: Easy and Fun. That causes a conflict when Rational Decision-Maker knows that we need to do something to reach a goal and have a good outcome.

"For the procrastinator, that conflict tends to end a certain way every time, leaving him spending a lot of time in this orange zone, an easy and fun place that's entirely out of the Makes Sense circle. I call it the Dark Playground. Now, the Dark Playground is a place that all of you procrastinators out there know very well. It's where leisure activities happen at times when leisure activities are not supposed to be happening. The fun you have in the Dark Playground isn't actually fun, because it's completely unearned, and the air is filled with guilt, dread, anxiety, self-hatred—all of those good procrastinator feelings."

So how does a procrastinator get out of the Dark Playground? The Panic Monster, of course. Asleep most of the time, The Panic Monster comes out when a deadline gets too close and there's some scary consequence, be it public embarrassment or a career disaster, that looms. The Panic Monster is the only thing Instant Gratification Monkey is afraid of. When he shows up, the monkey flees, allowing Rational Decision-Maker to take the steering wheel once again.

"And this entire situation, with the three characters, this is the procrastinator's system," Urban explained. "It's not pretty, but in the end, it works."

Procrastination without deadlines is actually harder to manage

However, he added, there are actually two kinds of procrastination—the kind with a deadline, where The Panic Monster inevitably always shows up, and the kind where there is no deadline, which means The Panic Monster stays asleep.

"It's this long-term kind of procrastination that's much less visible and much less talked about than the funnier, short-term deadline-based kind," Urban shared. "It's usually suffered quietly and privately. And it can be the source of a huge amount of long-term unhappiness and regrets." He said that he had heard from people who struggle with this kind of procrastination and come to the conclusion: "The frustration is not that they couldn't achieve their dreams; it's that they weren't even able to start chasing them."

Urban concluded his talk by sharing a visual of boxes, each representing a week of a 90-year life.

"That's not that many boxes, especially since we've already used a bunch of those," he said. "So I think we need to all take a long, hard look at that calendar. We need to think about what we're really procrastinating on, because everyone is procrastinating on something in life."

People in the comments appreciated feeling seen, even though many of them said they'd had the video saved to watch for months or years before finally getting around to it.

media.giphy.com

"Really the worst part of being a procrastinator is the guilt you endure everyday. Man it legit hurts."

"'The frustration wasn't that they couldn't achieve their dreams, but they weren't even able to start chasing them.' That one sentence has beautifully and effectively summed up my feelings in a way I haven't been able to."

"The worst feeling is being in the dark playground and something makes you think of the stuff you have to do. You just get that quick hit of anxiety."

"As a procrastinator I often feel like everybody else is moving forward and im just standing still."

"He just explained my whole life in 14 minutes."

Urban's talk doesn't offer much in the way of solving the procrastination problem, but he does have a whole long blog post on his website, complete with more illustrations, with advice for reducing the procrastination habit. Find his "How to Beat Procrastination" tips here.

human behavior
Health

Positive psychology expert shares how her simple 'Monday Math' can help you live your best life

It's a positive wake-up call.

via Matthias Cooper

A woman enjoying her life.

It can be frustrating to feel motivated enough to pursue your dreams when your life is already packed with responsibilities and you have a limited amount of energy and attention. But we all have those things in life we’ve always wanted to do, such as learning a skill, traveling, or becoming more physically and mentally fit.

Jodi Wellman, who has a Master’s degree in applied positive psychology from the University of Pennsylvania and founded Four Thousand Mondays, coaches people on how to be more motivated by facing their limited time on Earth.

The concept may seem a bit morbid initially, but she says that when people honestly appraise their mortality, it’s great for long-term motivation. “My top tip is to get granular with what I call mortality math,” Wellman told CNBC Make It. “So we have to get really in tune with the temporary nature of our lives ... because otherwise, we won’t take action, we will languish.”

Wellman has a calculator on her site that shares the number of Mondays you have left based on current life expectancy. (The following is a calculation for a 47-year-old man.)

get motivated, four thousand mondays, jodi wellman

The number of Mondays a 47-year-old man has left.

via Four Thousand Mondays

Wellman believes that when we truly understand we can only put things off for so long, we are more likely to follow our passions. “Later is an elusive time that may never come,” Wellman said. It’s also worth considering that some of the Mondays come when we’re older when it's more difficult to travel or do things that require physical strength.

“If you were going to die tonight, what would you wish you had taken action on? Maybe there’s an opportunity to start that today,” she added.

Mondays help put our lives in perspective. For many, it’s the first day back at work after the weekend, when it's time to get back on task, make new plans, start a new habit, or take on new responsibilities. Knowing there are only so many left can be a great motivator.

Wellman’s Four Thousand Mondays philosophy is based on the psychological concept of temporal scarcity, which states that it can be challenging to find joy in some of life’s pleasant experiences unless we know that they will come to an end.

It’s also based on the Freudian principle that we tend to seek pleasure and avoid pain and we will go to great lengths to prevent momentary pain. This can hinder us from pursuing our dreams which might involve a bit of initial discomfort.

By counting the number of Mondays we have left, we can avoid having painful end-of-life regrets when we realize that time is running out on our dreams. Wellman hopes that her philosophy provides a wake-up call for people to start living the life they always wanted because it’s later they think.

“We can fathom our deathbed regrets, for example, to sprinkle that dose of ‘oh sh**’ we need to take action in our lives,” she wrote on her blog. “We can focus on our limited lifespans and live with verve and vigor, to avoid the pain and heartache of a lackluster life we didn’t try hard enough to enjoy. In short, we will brazenly embrace the dark side… like a sneaky shortcut to the bright side.”

From Your Site Articles
motivation tips
Pop Culture

Woman flips the script on habits, touting the benefits of a 'chaotically organized life'

Being unable to stick to routines and habits doesn't mean you're lazy, says Elizabeth Filips.

Elizabeth Filips/YouTube

Elizabeth Filips shares some refreshing insights for people who can't stick to habits.

One of the beautiful things about humans is how diverse we are. Not just in the way we look, dress and eat, but in the way we feel, think and process. What works for one person won't necessarily work for another, and trying to force a square peg into a round hole is just an exercise in frustration.

This truth is particularly apparent in the realm of productivity.

Productivity "hacks" are everywhere these days. As of July 2023, James Clear's book "Atomic Habits" has sold 15 million copies worldwide. Clear's approach to habit formation has made waves because it feels far more accessible and achievable than many others—and indeed, many have found it life-changing—but what if consistent habits and routines aren't a part of your makeup?

That's the question Elizabeth Filips addresses in a script-flipping video describing how her brain simply works differently.

Filips is an artist, medical student, author, podcaster and YouTube creator who has accomplished an astonishing amount in what she refers to as her "chaotically organized" life. For her, productivity doesn't look like consistency, habit and routine—the things that are so often drilled into us as the keys to getting things done. Rather, she's learned to harness her passion-led motivation and work in huge, productive spurts of focus.

Essentially, it's the inverse of the "Atomic Habits" method of small, consistent improvements. Rather than get 1% better at something each day, Filips "primes" her passion for a task, waits until she gets to a point of "I have to learn this now!" and then makes 100%, 500%, 5000% improvements, all in one fell swoop.

It's a familiar way of working for people with ADHD, only Filips actually explains the methodology of it in a way that turns it into a legitimate productivity approach. It's not necessarily laziness if you can't keep up with routines and habits—it may be that you are wired for more of a passion-primed sprint way of getting things done rather than a purposefully paced marathon.

Watch Filips explain:

Filips also created a follow-up video explaining how one potential downfall of this method is that you might quit things too often when the passion for them wanes. She explains how to not quit everything you start in this video:

Here's to the various ways we all think and work and make the best use of our time. Productivity doesn't look the same for everyone, so if you feel like you're a square peg trying to squeeze yourself into a round hole when you read about habits and routine, maybe you just need to embrace chaotic organization. There's no "wrong" way, as long as what you're doing works for you.

Follow Elizabeth Filips on YouTube and check out her website here for more.

From Your Site Articles
productivity
Family

He was always on his phone. Then he made this incredible change you can try too.

10 simple steps to break bad habits and take back control.

I had fallen into a dangerous loop. I knew I was doing it too much.

It was easy to justify checking my phone constantly — especially since I work on a newsletter that collects valuable ideas from around the web. I was constantly browsing and searching, all day, every day.

So I did something about it.

I didn’t take a "digital detox" and completely abandon social media for a brief period of time because that feels more like a temporary treatment than an actual solution. I might have felt better for a couple days, but once I returned from my detox, I assume everything else would have gone back to "normal" — and normal wasn’t working for me.

I set out to change my phone habits and create a simple set of rules to limit the negative (and amplify the positive) impacts of when and how I use my phone.

What I came up with was this set of 10 guidelines to ensure I used my phone with more intention. They made a huge difference in how often I check my phone, what I get out of it, and how I feel about it.

1. I stopped checking my phone in my car.

I never really checked my phone while driving — it's dangerous (and you should definitely stop that whether you try out these rules or not), but with this rule I also outlawed checking it at stoplights, in heavy traffic, or any time I was in my car.

I discovered how often I was checking my phone in the car previously, how unnecessary it was, and how it actually made things like sitting in traffic more frustrating than they otherwise might be.

2. I stopped checking my phone during TV commercials.

I hate commercials as much as the next guy, and sometimes social media seems like it was invented to fill up those two-minute interruptions — no wonder I checked my phone at every TV timeout.

But when I picked up my phone during a commercial, I rarely put it back down when the show came back on. It captured my attention and drew it away from what I actually wanted to watch.

To help me stick with this rule, I implemented another one…

3. I kept my phone across the room when I wasn’t using it.

Turns out the only thing stronger than the allure of social networks is the allure of not getting up off the couch.

The further my phone is from me, the less likely I am to randomly check it.

4. I turned off all notifications.

If we enable them, we are asking our phones to interrupt us. This interruptions can be unnecessary and poisonous. Now, there are no dings when somebody likes my Facebook post or sends me an email.

5. I chose an end point for each random surfing session.

I believe in the value of "getting lost on the internet" and continue to do so. But now, when I pick up my phone to do some random surfing, I set an end point for the journey before I start. For example, when I decide to browse Twitter, I also consciously decide to do so for just 20 minutes.

It protects my time and ensures a little surfing doesn’t turn into a time suck, but it also creates a space for me to explore and discover new things.

6. I stopped checking my phone while in line.

There’s nothing inherently wrong with this, but it’s definitely not an intentional use of your phone.

By following this rule, I send a message to myself that I’m in control of my attention as opposed to ceding it to my phone any time I’ve got a moment to spare.

7. I created a framework for my day with buffers at the beginning and end of it.

If the first thing I do when I wake up and the last thing I do before going to sleep is to check my phone, what kind of message does that send to my brain about the role of my phone in my life?

One of the simplest things I did to switch up my phone habits was to create a buffer zone — in the morning and at night — when I don’t use my phone.

I don’t pick up my phone until I’ve finished breakfast (which typically means I’ve been up for at least 30 minutes) and stop using my phone at least an hour before going to sleep.

8. I put my phone away after I post something on social media.

After I post an article or a tweet or a Facebook status, I’m going to be tempted to check and see whether people like and share it over the next hour or two.

To counteract this pull, I made it a rule to log off after posting something and not check my phone for a while. It’s a conscious effort to avoid getting drawn into my phone in an unnecessary usage pattern.

Likes, shares, or interactions will still be there when I check back in, and I don’t need to follow the action in real time.

9. I stopped repeating the cycle.

By the time I went through checking a couple of email addresses, my Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, and Medium accounts, enough time went by that I felt the urge to go back to the beginning of the cycle and check them all again to see what was new since I last checked.

Obviously, that’s not a great habit.

I created this rule, which means I go through the cycle and check each platform once per phone-use session, and when I’m done, I’m done.

10. I recognized it’s a work in progress.

One of the reasons I don’t like the concept of a full digital detox is because it’s an all-or-nothing scenario ,  and I don’t believe that’s how we ultimately create positive, lasting change.

My effort to be more intentional with my phone hasn’t been perfect, but it has helped me start to make lasting changes in my habits.

Like all things, it’s a work in progress. That’s OK. The point is to head in the right direction and learn along the way  —  and that’s exactly what these rules helped me to do. I hope they help you as well.

This article originally appeared in the "For the Interested" newsletter, a weekly collection of ideas to help you learn, do, and become better. It is reprinted here with permission.

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