I gladly receive many emails with questions related to psychology. A few days ago I received one from a person who asked me to tell him why he procrastinated. So, without preliminaries. I usually receive these types of queries, from people who are having a hard time and want an answer that can help them.
It would have been very easy for me to tell him that his procrastination It was caused because he did not know his “why”, or that he was not focused or that he lacked a clear motivation; But instead I responded with “it depends” and an invitation to conduct a more detailed study of your case. I also invited you to read this article.
«A person with low self-esteem collapses when they have many decision options since it generates more fear of failure and more fear of making the wrong decision»
Tomas Navarro
Psychologist
The cases that end up causing us to procastrine can be very varied and that is why a careful study is necessary. Look, I will only give you as an example a possible case that explains to us Barry Schwartz.
Schwartz is a contemporary psychologist who usually discusses psychology in the NY Times and in one of his stellar investigations he discovered that people with low self-esteem They have worse performance when making decisions.
Specifically, he has seen two very interesting phenomena. The first is that a person with low self-esteem collapses when he has many decision optionsn since it generates more fear of failure and more fear of making the wrong decision, which is why they tend to postpone pending decisions more.
When it comes to deciding whether to go on vacation to the beach or to the mountains it is easy, but when it comes to deciding which beach we go to on vacation, things get complicated for people who have low self-esteem. Maybe a trick we can apply is to go limiting alternatives. When many possible alternatives have to be studied, the range of decisions is so wide that a person insecure ends up collapsing.
But, on the other hand, what interests me most is that a person with low self-esteem usually feels dissatisfied with their decisions, which is why they tend to regret it and think a lot about what they have decided.
If there is not decision there is no fear of error and therefore there is no repentance. Look, we already have an explanation for the procrastination of the person who sent me the email. Sure, as long as you have low self-esteem.
Thanks to good Schwartz we now know that the reason for the procrastination of people with low self-esteem is that fear of losing the best option and the regret avoidance that torments them so much and… what is more important… by knowing it we can work on it.
You cannot work equally on the fear of being wrong that, for example, the lack of alternativesthe paralysis by analysis or postponement due to having a passive attitude.
There is also procrastination due to excess perfectionismby distress and fear for how it will be or what will happen, for lack of interest and motivation, for saturation, overload, distractions, poor time organization, fatigue, passatism, lack of discipline, disorganization or lack of definition of what we should do…
We can procrastinate for a thousand reasons and you, now you know one. If this is your case, I hope that understanding it helps you take a step forward.
You can discover other tips from Tomás Navarro (@tomasnavarropsi on Instagram) to set limits on those people who harm us in their work’Your red lines (Zenith/Planet). And also, you can read others here articles by Tomás Navarro in ABC Bienestar.
#relationship #selfesteem #habit #postponing #decisions
