This is how procrastination outsmarts you.

It tells you, “[This] is not important.” So you may hear statements like, “This isn’t the right time for me to be doing this.” 

It may sound like, “I shouldn’t be doing my administrative work right now, because planning for the upcoming quarter is more important.” 

That’s fine, and possibly even true, except you also know the emotional truth: you don’t want to do the administrative work. You want a smart—or at least acceptable—reason not to do it, and there’s no reason better than, “It’s not important.”

In reality, importance is relative. It’s important if you know you’ll feel bad about not doing it, and knowing it looms over you affects your work and your mood while you’re living it.

In Matt Ragland’s case, he woke up at 5am to get a head start on his work… except his son would wake up at the same time. So the statement sounded like, “This is my time! I need to work/exercise/meditate/read!” Instead, he flipped it, and decided to make that time his special time for his son. Genius!

In my case, I’d hear things like, “Cooking is important, I need to work [on my writing/on my business].” Except of course, I’d inevitably get extremely hungry at 11am, and dread having to think about food (let alone cooking it), and I’d experience extreme disappointment in myself. It was almost like I got upset with myself for getting hungry. In therapy, the genius idea came up: cook first thing after breakfast. 

Life has gotten much better for me, and I actually have more time and energy to do so-called important work, because I’m not worried about getting hungry.
Whatever life needs from you, right now, that’s what is important. Not what you think it needs from you.