Procrastination Explained: To Act, Or Not to Act?

We have all been paralysed by procrastination at some point in our life. Whether it was due to fear of failure or fear of success, or perhaps the peer pressure to be perfect and adhere to societal norms, the result was always the same – inactivity.

We chose to stay distracted instead of taking action in the direction of our goals.

We chose to waste time and energy instead of investing them into productive pursuits.

We chose to sit in the zone of comfort instead of exploring what lies beyond it.

Well, Napoleon Hill might have cracked the code as to how to defeat procrastination, but first let's examine what procrastination paralysis does to your inner world.

The Procrastination Paralysis

Imagine you had a vision of what you wanted to achieve in life. You also had resources, like time, energy, connections and money, to make it happen.

But for some reason you decided that TODAY is no good for embarking on such important mission like accomplishing your dreams.

So you settled on TOMORROW as the big day you'll begin to channel your potential.

Then tomorrow arrived and you still weren't persuaded it's time to begin your mission yet.

As Napoleon Hill writes:

"Procrastination is the bad habit of putting off until the day after tomorrow what should have been done the day before yesterday."        

That's the human condition – we wait for the perfect time as if there's perfect time.

There isn't.

There's only now.

Today.

This very moment!

What's more, Napoleon Hill reminds us:

"Most of us go through life as failures, because we are waiting for the “time to be right” to start doing something worthwhile. Do not wait. The time will never be “just right.” Start where you stand, and work with whatever tools you may have at your command, and better tools will be found as you go along."        

Many dreamers have been defeated, because they believed that their success lies somewhere outside of them – in the perfect opportunity, the perfect timing, the perfect environment, and so on.

In truth, our success begins when and where we begin. It's the only way for us to succeed really: to take the first step in a new pursuit and keep walking until we get to a milestone.

Even failures are milestones. They are the finish lines of projects and initiatives that lacked something, which we can resolve in the next attempt, so long as we continue to try!

Success doesn't happen in the state of procrastination paralysis. But there's something important that you can discover about yourself if you're brave enough to look within: the key to unblocking your path forward!

The Procrastination Antidote

This is the breakthrough moment you've been waiting for!

The antidote to procrastination isn't action ❌

While "To Act, or Not to Act?" might sound very Shakespearean, the key to unblocking your path forward is actually connected to your belief system.

The antidote to procrastination is understanding why you're not acting ✅

After all, Napoleon Hill's book is called "Think and Grow Rich" and not "Act and Grow Rich".

Thinking without actions in alignment with your thought patterns will NOT bring you success in the same way action without getting your belief system in alignment with a true success mindset will NOT get you out of the "rat race".

Here's the quote that made me rethink how I view procrastination and how to defeat it:

"PROCRASTINATION, the opposite of DECISION, is a common enemy which practically every man must conquer."        

Do you see it?

You must first make up your mind and decide which way you want to go. Then the excuses will go away on their own!

That's the thing, most of us already know which way we want to go – which way our heart is telling us to go next.

What often blocks us in life is our own stubborn nature when it comes to listening to our intuition.

In other words – we block ourselves, because we think we know better than our own belief system, which we have personally constructed over the course of our life to keep us safe and sane in an unpredictable world.

It doesn't matter how much you THINK you know yourself: the conscious mind cannot compare to the subconscious mind.

So keep this in mind:

If you're serious about defeating procrastination, you must first examine your subconscious mind and all the beliefs you've developed about the world.        

There's a reason you block yourself and that reason might not be logically sound, because the subconscious mind works with emotions and it is, therefore, emotionally charged.

Decide you want to be free and a new pathway will open before you to get you where your Higher Self can lead the way.

Decide you want to be abundant and new opportunities will present themselves in different packages and places to test your ability to recognise true abundance.

Decide you want to be happy and watch how the people around you shift, so you can have a supportive system that can actually uplift your consciousness to the next level.

Such is the magic of life – the flame of a single decision can ignite the way to success!

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