Some of you might have recognized the title of this post. Others are reading it for the first time but, after thinking a little, are beginning to agree with it. It’s known as Parkinson’s Law and it’s one of those bits of wisdom that observation of the world brings us. This one’s a big deal for us procrastinators in two very different and seemingly opposite ways. A few posts back I talked about the Student Syndrome and if you remember, how it refers to the tendency people, but mostly students, have to put off work on an assignment until the last possible moment. This tendency helps them, some say, to get fired up about the work, getting adrenaline pumping through their veins, and igniting the passion in them. In the stricter of terms this is correct, although it is very risky because it doesn’t leave any margin of error to cope with another law derived from observation, Murphy’s Law. In spite of all it’s flaws The Student Syndrome does one thing very well, and that is curb Parkinson’s Law. When we only allocate the least amount of time possible to a task then we can’t be afraid of that task taking all of our time. So you’d think this is an apology for procrastination, but it is not, because even though this could be a way for procrastinators to rationalize their ways it is also true that we can limit Parkinson’s Law on our own. Let’s go back to the Law that says that “Work expands so as to fill the time available for its completion”. It’s a perfectionist’s way of life and most of us can certainly relate to this. While we’ve got time to deliver we won’t stop reviewing, verifying, checking once, twice, thrice and more the work we’ve done. Or we can spend a lot of time previous to starting the work, procrastination 101. We can research again and again, on related topics, on the tools of our trade, on the merchants of said tools, etc. Researching before and reviewing after are not problems on their own, but they are a problem when they get in the way of doing the work. So, what can we do? Well, it’s so easy you will tell me to find a real solution, and that is we can limit the time we allow ourselves to work on the task, that’s it. Do we think it’ll take 4 hours to complete? 
Well, then complete it in that much time, after which you’re not allowed to go back to the task under some sort of self imposed penalty. You need to penalize yourself as if you were going over the deadline because if you are lenient you won’t take this seriously. Penalties will only be necessary at first don’t you worry, because you’ll have to limit the time you spend on everything, and I mean EVERYTHING. And here’s my best advice of the day for you. In order to be able to limit the time you set for your activities you’ll first have to know what your activities are, what tasks need be done and which are routine activities you already have or want to adopt. What? You say it seems I’m going to talk about a schedule? Well, you’re right. For the worst procrastinators of us a detailed schedule will be necessary if we want to use our times the best we can. I for one have a terrible memory and if I don’t allocate the hours of the day for my different tasks and habits I might skip something. If you’re comfortable with having it all in your head, you don’t drop any ball, and feel good freestyling it, by all means, be my guest, but if you feel anxious, lose focus and track of time, then you should schedule everything. So, that’s it, Parkinson’s Law can make us lazy crazy and give us the impression of accomplishment when we really wasted lots of time if we ignore it’s existence. When we tame it, we can use it to our advantage and let it work for us, just like we do with the law of gravity. Another tool for your tool belt.
Books mentioned in this post
Right, FOCUS, I was going to talk to you about focus. As I see focus is the ability to concentrate one’s efforts or thoughts on a single object or idea. Pretty simple right? Well, as we’ve seen I am a little odd so focusing for me is very difficult. I get distracted by almost everything, or everything, I’m not sure. I really have to work hard to be able to focus, and that’s where problems start, because you see, I use part of my energy just to be able to use my energy, very silly if you ask me. So, to overcome this, I am exercising on pure and simple focus right now. In my morning meditation I focus on different parts of my body and I cycle through them. And I go like that for 30 to 40 minutes. Again, it sounds silly but I know better now than to dismiss practice. You know, unlike most of you I didn’t practice a sport regularly as a boy, so that part got missed by me, this is something I have to learn now, and it’s not easy. Back to focusing, see what I mean. During my day I have to worry, as you might have to, about many things pertaining to my work, home, or personal spheres. Each one requires my attention. And I try to focus on each particular task, until something else pops up that is. This is where productivity experts of many sorts have been able to help most of us. Many of you have already a productivity routine in place, but some don’t. I’ve found out that the most important part of this routines is being able to focus anew on the task at hand when focus gets broken. We can try to prevent external interruptions, and we must, but there will always be internal interruptions that can’t be muted, sent to voice-mail or unattended in some way. And those are the most frequent ones. So, in the coming weeks I’ll try to post regularly on this topic, much more pertinent this blogs unstated mission (note to self, write the mission out, not just think about it) of helping people fight procrastination. If you are asking “how a productivity hack can help me prevent procrastination?” then either you need this more than you think or the cause of your procrastination is deeper, and that’s another subject that we’ll take on on another post. In the mean time, how do you think that focusing and regaining focus immediately would help you finish your tasks better? How about achieving your goals? How about having a better life?