I’M OVERWHELMED
so I don’t do anything

PREVIOUS : Procrastination,#1

SITE: Potential Cost of Procrastination  (w/ charts, & re. Money)

QUOTE: “Time you enjoy wasting is not wasted time.” ~ Marthe Troly-Curtin

1. PAST Causes of Procrastination (cont)
f. Being put down  // g. dismissed or devalued
h. never (or rarely) acknowledged

i. Double Messages, leaving us ‘feeling’ crazy – adults who constantly gave us confusing or conflicting messages about what was expected of us, or how to do things, SO now we don’t trust our judgement

j  Expected &/or forced to take care of them, never allowed to focus on our personality,, SO now we refuse to use all that experience & creativity for ourself, wanting someone else to do it for us. Been there, done that!

k. Punished (insults, being hit, yelled at, sent to our room, made fun of, threatened….) – for having need, wants & emotions, as well as for not doing everything the ‘right’ way, ie. their way, or just not knowing how to do something – even tho’ we were too young, untrained & inexperienced, but they expected us to be mind-readers, & act like adults anyway!

l. Absorbed & took on our parent’s fear – who repeatedly warned us about the dangers of people, places & things, SO we became fearful of everything too

m. Neglected, ignored – having to fend for ourself – left alone to figure things out, when too young – not getting encouragement, guidance, ‘how to’ or just safe & loving company, which made us feel insecure & too alone.

ACoA “LOGIC”: I keep putting it off because –
• IF I ignore it long enough maybe it’ll magically go away
• I feel comforted – because not being fully functional keeps me from having to feel the abandonment pain of no one being there to teach, help or encourage me thru things when growing up

• It’s not fair that I have to do things by myself, for myself
• Since I hate doing it, I’ll wait until the very last hour or two, then cram in whatever I can manage. That way I’ll have an excuse for not doing it better (no time)
ALSO: maybe there’ll be a hail-mary save (rescued),
OR – someone usually does show up to help at the last minute (luck), so I’ll just wait

🔆     🔅     🔆
2. NOW we put things off because of:
❓Feelings
• it reminds us of how we didn’t get helped as kids. All those ‘little’ abandonments add up to one big pain!
• automatically assume we’ll be abused, or left (A.) if we act on our own behalf

• haven’t learned how to deal with the PP voice that controls the WIC (Introject)
• we are deeply conflicted – to do or not do, to obey or disobey, to do it our way or theirs, to be separate or stay symbiotic…. Intense inner conflicts leave us paralyzed!
• afraid of ‘hurting’ others’ feelings OR having them be angry at us, which would mean getting emotionally abandoned (cut off) by them

❓ Knowledge
• we don’t know what’s actually stopping us (denial)
• anything we’ve figure out for ourself is considered either wrong or not of any value (crap)
• we never actually learned process – how to reach a goal by going thru a series of necessary steps. We look for instant grat, or we make a half-hearted attempt, or we take the least effective steps. When these don’t work we give up, rather than learn what actually works!

• we believe in our deepest being that anything we do has to be perfect, & not being able to that – we end up doing nothing
• don’t know how to do something AND can’t ask for help, OR feel like we have no one to ask
• afraid of what we’ll find out (outcome of a job interview, medical tests, how much is -or isn’t- in the bank…)

NEXT: “Procrastination” Part 3