Coaching practices for Stop Procrastinating Big Tasks

Describe almost anything you are working through and IX Coach finds the practices whose real-world fit is closest. For Stop Procrastinating Big Tasks, these are the strongest matches in the current practice library.

Does this sound like the set of challenges you might be facing?

• I keep waiting for a free afternoon to finally dig into the big project, and that block never comes
• There’s one hard thing I’m dreading, so I "warm up" on easy busywork to feel productive
• The task is so huge and shapeless I don’t even know where it begins, so I just freeze and avoid it
• There’s this pile of old half-finished tasks I keep stepping over, and each one is its own little tug of guilt
• There’s a pile of things I’ve been putting off

Practices that may help

1. Use the "little and often" approach for long projects
   Chip at big projects every day in small doses rather than saving them for marathon sessions.
   Do It Tomorrow, Made Practical
2. Do the hardest task first
   Tackle your single most important, most-dreaded task before anything else in the day.
   Eat That Frog, Made Practical
3. Slice and dice the task
   Cut an overwhelming frog into small slices and commit to just the first one.
   Eat That Frog, Made Practical
4. Systematically process the backlog
   Work through old, unfinished tasks in order rather than perpetually re-triaging them.
   Do It Tomorrow, Made Practical
5. Tackle one avoided task per week
   Schedule one thing you have been avoiding — completing it relieves more energy than the task cost.
   Pleasant Events Scheduling, Made Practical
6. Make the long-term consequences of procrastinating feel immediate
   Present-focus is the cognitive driver of task deferral — make future costs feel present.
   Task Aversion and Procrastination
7. Place an important-seeming but deferrable task at the top of your list
   Put a compelling but non-urgent task first, so everything below it gets done in avoidance of it.
   Structured Procrastination, Made Practical
8. Acknowledge the cumulative health and well-being costs of chronic delay
   Chronic procrastination is a health behavior — the long-term costs extend beyond missed deadlines.
   Task Aversion and Procrastination
9. Review the list to prevent permanent deferral
   Structured procrastination works only if the top item eventually gets done — build in periodic forcing.
   Structured Procrastination, Made Practical
10. The ABCDE prioritization method
    Label every task A (must), B (should), C (nice), D (delegate), or E (eliminate) before starting.
    Eat That Frog, Made Practical

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