I am engaged in a weight loss journey and the real treat of it is gaining insights into human nature. Why do we sometimes do things that are not in our best interest? How does our environment affect our choices? Can we reverse habits and behaviors that keep us from reaching our potential? What behaviors truly lead to health and weight loss?
Based on over a year of reading thousands of posts on weight loss blogs, I have a pretty strong hypothesis that two behaviors are common to all weight loss success stories:
getting started and never giving up. The latter is a combination of optimism, tenacity, and resilience. But what about getting started? With so many Americans with so much to lose, why don't they get started? And why didn't I get started for so long?
It was in that spirit that I picked up
The Procrastination Equation: How to Stop Putting Things Off and Start Getting Stuff Done. Piers Steel, author and University of Calgary professor, is an expert in the field of procrastination. This book is based on Steel's meta-analysis (a statistical synthesis of research) of the substantial academic study of procrastination. His book is a worthy read and will give you insights into your behavior and the behavior of others.
Ironically, the book plays out as the opposite of the procrastination curves he so cleverly illustrates in its pages. While the productivity of a procrastinator stays very low over time, swooping to a sudden peak approaching a deadline, this book is fast out of the gate, only to settle into a pedestrian pace. After the first few chapters bring new clarity to the understanding of procrastination, the remainder revisits concepts that are known by readers familiar with the topic. But I did learn a great deal, which I'll focus on here.
First, the equation. Steel lays out a simple mathematical equation to express the likelihood of procrastination:
Expectancy x Value
Impulsiveness x Delay
With a quick definition of terms, the formula makes sense. To friends and co-workers I've shared it with, naming the components of procrastination strikes a chord on an intuitive level:
- Expectancy - the belief one has that he or she will be successful on a task
- Value - whether or not the task is perceived to be worthwhile
- Impulsiveness - how prone one is to distraction and impulsive behavior
- Delay - the amount of time before the task is due
Put succinctly, the more you value a task and think you can succeed at it, the sooner you'll get started. On the other hand, the farther off the due date is and the more impulsive you are when presented with distractions, the later you'll get started.
Steel illustrates this with a resonant example: the college term paper assignment, which he calls the "perfect storm" of procrastination. A term paper is assigned at the beginning of the semester, due at the end of the semester (delay). Students know that grading is subjective, making them uncertain they will get a good mark regardless how much they work on it (expectancy). To the student, the paper itself represents little more than a hoop to be jumped through (value). And along the way, friends, Facebook, dating, and a cable TV marathon of the student's favorite show all offer more immediate reward than starting the paper (impulsiveness). By the time the student starts writing in earnest, he's faced with an all-nighter and the product is less than his best work.
I shared this scenario recently in a meeting where we are redesigning our organization's annual improvement planning document. Every year, we assign it to all of our key leaders nearly six months before it is due, and every year we are inundated with requests for extensions the week before it is due. It never made sense, until reading Steel's book and realizing we had inadvertently contributed to the procrastination by introducing delay to the equation. In fact, establishing short-term goals and deadlines is probably the single most useful lesson of the book.
The Procrastination Equation is full of insights into human nature and the nature of procrastination. For one, you will also learn that perfectionism is not a cause of procrastination, though it is widely thought of that way. Don't believe it? Then ask yourself if perfectionists tent to be organized or disorganized. Of course, perfectionists are organized, and procrastinators generally aren't. (It may be that "I didn't start out of fear of not being perfect" is really a form of self-doubt, a.k.a. expectancy, and I'm surprised Steel doesn't make this connection explicitly.)
Steel's writing is colorful and maintains your attention. I particularly enjoyed his passage on the delay device that's built into most bedroom clocks:
"The snooze button is the devil's device, a procrastination-enabling technology that lets you easily put off your original goal of waking up, in order to grab a few more minutes of low quality slumber."
We know we should get up, but push that snooze button anyway. I'm speaking hypothetically, of course! But that leads to another lesson of the book.
Not all delay is procrastination. One of the first objectives of the book is to inform the reader that it's irrational delay that constitutes procrastination. Putting things off isn't procrastination, if you have a good reason, such as "I'll cut the lawn when it's not raining." Delay becomes procrastination when you know you are sabotaging yourself, but you do it anyway.
That's a good segue back to diet and health. Though Steel gives only passing mention to the relationship of procrastination to weight issues, he does name health among the areas of life that suffer at the hands of procrastination. Clearly, we know overeating and lack of exercise works against us, but we indulge in that irrational behavior anyway, postponing healthy choices for another day.
My own meaning making is that people fall into two procrastination traps that get in the way of weight loss. First, folks don't start. Health consequences of the extra pounds are too far down the road and we're all wired for immediate gratification. "I'll start tomorrow," becomes the mantra. Second, once started there is a daily battle with temptations that vie for our impulsive nature - the distractions that crowd out exercise and tempting foods that are ubiquitous in our culture.
The Procrastination Equation provides no new silver bullets to tackle these challenges, but the unifying theme of "set short-term goals" helps. You can make healthy choices gain the immediacy of the candy dish at the receptionist's desk or the social networking that keeps you out of the gym. For some of us, blogging helps. For others it's Weight Watchers, consistent use of the bathroom scale, or training for an event.
Steel recommends approaching procrastination as a habit that can be rebuilt, one step at a time, with small moves that add up over time to big changes. His book is not about weight loss, but it may help you understand why you sometimes act against your own long-term best interest. It'll bring you back to the lessons of our fellow weight loss bloggers. Get started. Be accountable in short-term increments. Keep going. And never give up.
