The Now Habit by Neil Fiore is a book that has occupied a leading space in overcoming procrastination since 1988. What differentiates Fiore’s book is the emphasis he places on the causes behind procrastination.  

Fiore doesn’t believe that a person who procrastinates is lazy. Instead, he elaborates on how procrastination is a method people adopt out of necessity, when they are feeling vulnerable to judgement.  

Fiore’s method of understanding this fear, and overcoming it, stems from a profound optimism in human nature. Rather than viewing humans as inherently lazy, he sees human beings as creatures who enjoy stimulating and meaningful work, and who prefer to do things to the best of their ability.  

If we adopt a similarly optimistic view, it is not helpful to treat procrastination with the dictum: you need to be disciplined. The way to help a person overcome procrastination is to employ positive psychology.  

It is important to understand the fears that make procrastination a more compelling choice than completing a task:  

• The fear of failure: the smallest evidence can be used as proof that you are an unworthy person 
• The fear of being imperfect (perfectionism): it is difficult for you to accept yourself as you are (an imperfect human) and so you interpret criticism, rejection, or judgement as a threat to our tenuous grasp on perfectionism.  
• The fear of impossible expectations (being overwhelmed): even after you’ve worked hard enough and have achieved your goals, you reward yourself with continually higher and more difficult goals to achieve, with no rest and no time to savor your achievements. 

These fears are crippling. They overwhelm a person. It becomes easier to do something else; to instantly alleviate the fear in exchange for temporary rewards. While you avoid it, the task grows bigger, and more tasks build up. You enter a cycle of dodging the most important activities in your life.  

The most evident consequence of this cycle is that it feels like you never get any leisure time. All the tasks you still have to do hang over your head, and so your leisure time makes you feel guilty, and presents itself as just another procrastination technique.  

So, what is the solution?  

The Now Habit is about putting aside the fear of failure, feelings of overwhelm and low self-esteem and focusing on now.  

Stop living in the future or berating yourself for the past. In the present you are safe, and things are possible. In the present you can control the outcome.  

Fiore offers 10 strategies to handle procrastination. These are:  

• Creating Safety: Your psychological safety is of the most importance when addressing the symptoms of procrastination.  

• Reprogramming negative attitudes through positive self-talk: Identify the negative voice inside your head; your inner critic and change that voice to something kinder. 

• Using symptoms to trigger the cure: use old habits to evoke new habits.  

• Guilt-free play: give yourself time away from work and work will no longer be a source of resentment.  

• Three-dimensional thinking and the reverse calendar: tackle important tasks methodically, by breaking down what needs to be achieved and scheduling it in.  

• Making worry work for you: develop plans for coping with distractions.  

• The Unshedule: prescheduled guilt free pleasure.  

• Setting realistic goals: Will help you clear yourself from guilt over tasks which you have no ability to work towards in the present.  

• Working in the flow state: utilize your body's natural energy peaks to enjoy tasks.  

• Controlled setbacks: learn to see setbacks as something that will help you in the long-run.  

It is Neil Fiore’s unwavering articulation of humans as good, rather than bad, that makes the Now Habit such a forgiving and cathartic read. If you battle with the crippling nature of procrastination, the Now Habit is a book that can help you, while validating your experience.  

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