I am extremely lazy and it's destroying my life (negative post)

[Vadim26]

I will make this short. As a tittle says, laziness and procrastination are Ruining my life. I am 21 and need to fix it ASAP.

 

I've been a lazy person since I probably started my university. I barely managed to finish my engineering degree with almost failing most of the subjects.

Things are getting worse. It has gotten to the extremes, like me not cooking food and starving, just because I don't feel like getting up from the bed. Sometimes I can spend hours watching youtube, lying in bed just to  look at the time after and realize how much time I have wasted and feel bad about everything.

I've taken Leo's course and have created an amazing, exciting life purpose that I want to pursue with all my heart (see my old post) but I can't take almost ANY action due to a lot of limiting beliefs / procrastination and laziness. I know about homeostasis, and approach of simply doing something and forcing myself seems to not be working.

 

Question is:  ***How did you turn your life around from being LAZY to Very productive and acing every aspect of your life?

                         ***Is a way to train will-power is by simply forcing myself to take action and ignore all the distraction? 

 

Also, I am in the process of reading Deep Work and will be trying those techniques shortly (procrastination again )

 

Thanks for reading

Edited July 21, 2018 by Vadim26
fixed

[egoeimai]

Do not judge your laziness cause it won't stop. That way you're beating yourself up and you don't give to yourself the motivation you need. Try to drop all labels about yourself,do this as a practice be aware of this mindset and try to have no label about you. Anyhow labels are useless and not necessarily true. 

That is going to take time. 

[KenDo]

I get how you feel, I also struggle with laziness and procrastination from time to time. There is a Japanese concept called kaizen which is similar to the mastery mentality. 

I think the reason why we don't take action is because we have some kind of goal we want to achieve and have huge expectations for how much we must achieve in a day/week/month. So my advice would be to start with baby steps and by achieving those it will motivate you to do more. You probably heard of this before and that is because it works!!! So for example you want to get a degree (large expectation). A baby step would be to study one page today or maybe just to open your school bag!

Try it and just be amazed, trust me on this one

[Moreira]

Your actual situation is comfortable, why would you change it? Thats why you are lazy and procrastinate.

Lets imagine a cyclone or earthquake destroys your house. You'd move your ass like no tomorrow.

[aurum]

@Vadim26

Notice that each time you go to procrastinate and be lazy, you justify it with a mental story.

You have to realize these stories are self-lies.

You think you tell yourself the truth, but this in of itself is not true. People lie to themselves constantly.

If you recognize the lie as a lie, it loses its power. Right now you're still not so sure it's a lie.

Next thing you have to do is ask yourself this: what BENEFIT am I getting from procrastination? And be specific.

For instance, maybe you benefit from procrastination because it keeps you safe. It keeps you from putting yourself out there and getting hurt. That's a real benefit.

Once you see the benefit, accept that part of yourself because it was helping you.

[exhale]

I do not know if that relates to you, and your situation.  Though I would recommend you consider the following. 

1) "Mood follows action" - Rich Roll. 

2) Sometimes we do not want to start, because we have unrealistic expectations that it has to be perfect from the onset (to quote you "acing every aspect of your life".  This is far too much pressure, make tomorrow 5-10% better than today, and use that momentum to your advantage.

Consider the possibility of a medical/psycho condition (such as hypothyroidism or depression, for example) that is a barrier for you.  

 

[Prabhaker]

23 hours ago, Vadim26 said:

I am extremely lazy

You are not extremely lazy. You have found this site and started a topic ! Laziness comes for certain reasons , may be because you don't see the point of doing anything, and even if you do nothing is achieved. 

Begin with chanting of AUM or some meditation like watching your breath , it will give you some fulfillment, some energy.

[Vadim26]

Thanks for all the replies guys! They were trully helpful. 

My problem is: I expect results right away. If I don't get it, I become less motivated to take required action. 

I shall stop judging myself for being lazy and simply acknowledge it AND drop all the big expectations and keep taking baby steps. 

It's hard to let go of anti-mastery mindset, because we are bombarded with messages every where: get fit quick, get rich quick, instant- something etc. 

Edited July 23, 2018 by Vadim26

[Katlicitas]

Hi Vadim
So there's one particular thing that has helped me a lot with procrastination.

When you're lying in bed, watching Youtube Videos and not being able to get up, even though you know you should be, idk, writing a thesis, cooking some food, doing laundry... Do one single, very small step towards it.
Like, even if it's just throwing the t-shirt next to you on the floor, so you know it needs to be cleaned.
Do not pressure yourself to do something in one sitting.
If your clothes are on the floor, put them in the washing machine. You don't need to turn in on, just put the clothes there, they'll wait for you. When you're getting a glass of water from your bathroom an hour later, you can maybe turn on the washing machine. And so on and so on.
Just do whatever you feel capable of doing in the moment. There's no need to do something quickly, if otherwise you wouldn't do it at all. This may sometimes work well, and other times not so well.

I hope you can take something from this advice (: best of luck

 

Edited July 23, 2018 by Katlicitas
spelling error

[exhale]

Hey Vadim, give this a watch.  I really clearly addresses your latter concern.

 

[david-c]

Dont use this as an excuse but teenagers are naturally lazy this is probably to do with evolutionary biology where teenagers are burring a lot of energy growing and probably did all the work which required speed and strength. People that grow up to be tall can be cack handed as when they are going up there parents tell them that they are cack handed and they carry on with this belief. The reason they were cack handed is because they are growing taller and they are having to adjust there body awareness to there changing size more.

[Winston]

Judging yourself will not help. But laziness is something you need to confront head on. Your laziness has become habitual and you need to break the pattern and develop a new habit of non laziness. I suggest you start a to do list. Only put 1-3 items on it that you must accomplish on a given day. Try and accomplish 1-3 tasks per day for 30 days. See if that works.