Are You Really Procrastinating?

You know what you need to do. You’ve learned the strategy. You’ve probably even put it in your calendar… and then somehow, you just don’t do it.

Once or twice? Totally normal. But when it keeps happening again and again, is procrastination really the problem — or is there something else going on underneath it?

In this episode, I’m talking about the invisible reasons we can avoid the work we genuinely WANT to do, why learning more isn’t always the answer, and a little experiment I tried earlier this year when I noticed myself falling into the same pattern.

I took a tool I normally use for manifesting and used it in a completely different way — and I’d estimate it helped me do around 80% more of the high-quality work that actually moves my business forward.

If you’ve ever thought, “I KNOW what to do, so why the heck am I not doing it?” — this episode is for you.

If you want help building your own 6 or 7 figure Coaching Business, come on over and connect with Kushla:

- on Instagram, you'll find her @KushlaChadwickOfficial

- on Facebook, come join our community here: Community

- To book a free $100k Roadmap Session or go on the waiting list for one, go here:  https://calendly.com/kushlateam/roadmap

Transcript

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I think as coaches, it doesn't really matter what niche you're in. We can all recognize that one of the most frustrating things can be when our client doesn't do the work, especially when they say they're going to do the work, right? Like you've talked about it, they've said, yep, I'm going to go do this. And maybe they've even put it in their schedule, you know, their calendar or whatever. And they know exactly what they're supposed to be doing. You've gone over the things with them, you know, and they understand what's going to be done. And then they come back the next week and they haven't done it. That's super frustrating, right? And you know, once or twice, totally fine. We all do that. Life happens, things come up. Sometimes you just don't feel like it that day. That's totally cool. You know, we're not machines. But when you start to see it happening again and again and again, that's when I think we need to get a little bit more curious about what's actually going on because for some people, this can go on for literally like weeks, months, and sometimes even years. I'm not even kidding. And obviously, we see this in ourselves as well, right? You put that, like you put down that you're going to do something, like maybe you're going to record a workshop that's going to go evergreen. You know, maybe you're going to go and create a landing page, and you know, all the specific things that go on it, right? And you know that this is the work that's going to actually help you actually implement the strategy you've learned. You've got the skills to do it, you basically know what the strategy is asking you to do, and then you don't do it. And often I don't even think we're consciously sitting there saying, well, at least I know that I'm not, I'm not, you know, I'm not saying I'm not going to do that today. You know, we just find ourselves doing other things, and then it's the end of the day, and you're like, Oh, I I didn't do that. Bummer, I'll do it tomorrow. And then tomorrow comes and you don't do it again. And I think we tend to just call that procrastination, but I don't know that calling it procrastination really helps us very much, right? Because all we've done is just give a name to the fact that we're not doing the thing, and we haven't actually worked out why we're not doing the thing. And I think this is a problem that we need to understand, both for our clients and for ourselves, because enrolling in another workshop or class or program that's basically going to teach you the same strategy that you've already learned three times is still not going to make you do it. And I think we have become a little bit addicted to learning and not doing. Of course, you know, doing isn't everything. I'm not saying we all need to be taking massive action every second of the day, but doing is required. At some point, if we want a result, we actually have to do something, right? So that's what I want to talk about today. Like, what is actually going on when you know what to do, you're capable of doing it, maybe you even want to do it, but for some reason you just keep not doing it. So anyway, last week I talked about the four conversations, which was really about the conversations that we're having between our current self and our future self. And I think this actually follows on really nicely from that because there's this whole other piece around knowing what you want, knowing what you need to do to get there, and then actually being able to get yourself to do it right. And earlier this year, I went through a spell where I don't know, like this is a bit of a confession here, but basically I found myself feeling like I was procrastinating as in I knew what needed to be done, but I wasn't doing it. And again, once or twice, totally fine, but I got myself in a little bit of a pattern, and um, you know, I just think I don't care, but when I start to notice a pattern, I think, okay, this is interesting. Like, why am I not doing these things, you know? Because these weren't things I didn't want to do, they were things that I knew moved my business forward, and sometimes I loved doing the particular things that I had avoided doing, and obviously they helped me reach more people, help me help more people, help me make more money, and they were actually aligned with how I actually want to work and live. So it wasn't like I was like trying to force myself to do a whole bunch of stuff that I hated because that's you know, that's a separate problem. I just wasn't doing it consistently. So I decided to try a little experiment, and there's a particular tool that I use in manifesting, and I thought I'm gonna use this tool slightly differently and see if it helps me get out of this little funk that I'm in, and I want to report back to you that it actually worked amazingly. And the tool is reverse journaling, and there's a particular methodology that I have around how I use and teach it. But if you haven't heard me talk about this before, basically instead of journaling about what you want to happen, you journal as though it has already happened. I won't get into the neuroplasticity of it all, but actually um going into an activity or a thing that you want is more of a memory, yeah, it just helps it, helps you to like basically become that person, think like that person, take action like that person, um, much much faster and much easier, right? Far less resistant. So, anyway, um reverse journaling. So, normally, let me just kind of go over how I would do this. I might use, like I said, that for like more of a manifesting perspective. But what I decided to do in this case was to just use it really practically with my work, as in like my day-to-day work. So at night, what I actually did is I wrote about the next day as though the day had already happened, and this would basically be the last thing that I'll do. Maybe I'd have a hot drink or something while I was doing it. Um, you know, and I'd write something like, um, you know, this morning I got up, I went for a walk, um, like straight away. And then I came home, I had, and I just described what I had for breakfast, uh, which was really yummy, and then I jumped straight into recording my podcast episode. Um, that went really well, and then I made sure, you know, blah, blah, blah. And I would just describe two or three things that I did. Like maybe I said, you know, I sent the emails and I followed up and I named the couple of people that I'd followed up with, or or whatever, right? And I will tell you, I did it, and I just would write it and not try and get myself into any state. Again, I'm just writing it as as easily as anything because it's just a memory, you know what I mean? I'm not trying to like put all of this positive energy into it, it's just a memory. So I do that and then I just go to bed. So um, another thing I want to say is I wasn't waking up the next morning and then obsessively checking what I'd written. If you haven't done this before, it's really important. Like, you're not putting any of that kind of resistant energy around it. Again, it's just a memory. So I wasn't turning it into another to-do list. Sometimes I would have a quick look at it just to remind myself, you know, of what I actually said I'd do. Um, and sometimes I wouldn't. And there really wasn't any pressure around it. But what I noticed was that when I did this, I would say I was getting about 80 to 90% more of the really high quality work done, which is phenomenal. Like that's that's a massive jump in like resistant-free productivity. Okay, that's huge. And when I say high quality work, I you know I don't mean just like more busy work. I don't mean I suddenly became this productivity machine. It was like ticking 47 things off a list every day. Um, though I will say, in addition to the things that I was ticking off of my eight-week projects, because I work in projects that go for six weeks and two weeks to review, right? And then I've got um like tasks that are also important to the business, but they're not related to the eight-week project, right? So, anyway, the eight-week project is always the um priority, but I did get you know a lot of other things off the list as well. So maybe I didn't get 47 things, but honestly, I did get a lot, a lot more things done. So, anyway, the work that I did actually helped me to help more people and create clients and make money and move my business forward, and that really got me thinking about what was happening because why would writing something in a journal the night before make such a difference to whether I actually did it the next day? And I think one possibility is that there's a very different feeling between thinking, oh far out, tomorrow I've got to record the podcast and I've got to send that email and I've got to do this, right? Versus writing about it as if it's already done. I recorded the podcast, it was great, I really enjoyed it. I sent the email, I feel so good that it's done. This is like totally different. And I'm not mentally rehearsing having to do it, I'm mentally remembering that I did do it. And I think that becomes really interesting when we start looking at what might actually be underneath some of the things we call procrastination because not all work is the same. You might find it incredibly easy to spend an hour doing something behind the scenes in your business, maybe going on Canva and making some pretty like stuff for your posts or your website or whatever, right? But the thing where you have to put yourself out there and actually make the offer or do the opinionated post or send the email or follow up with somebody, you know, say what you really think. Suddenly you find yourself doing something else, you know what I'm talking about, right? And maybe it's because there's something attached to that action, maybe there's a possibility of rejection, maybe it's visibility, maybe it's uncertainty, maybe you're worried it won't work. I mean, you know, there's good reason for that because sometimes things don't work, or at least they don't work the first, second, third, fourth, fifth, sixth time, or whatever, right? So there's reasons for all of these thoughts and feelings. And I think this is one we don't talk about enough. Maybe there's something about what happens if it does work. So what if people say yes? What if you get the clients? What if you make more money? What if people start paying attention to you? I remember one of my clients that I worked with. She would get to a certain level of income and then something big would happen, and it was like she was back at ground zero every time. And anyway, after a while noticing this pattern, we went over some things and we found actually there was a part of her that was absolutely afraid of having things work because she thought if she hit a certain income level, there was a part of her that wanted to leave her marriage, and she was afraid she would do like that's exactly what she'd do, you know. And um maybe your marriage is fine, or maybe you're not even married, or whatever, right? But there are a ton of things that can come up and worries that can come up for if things do work out, you know. What if your business actually grows into the thing you've been saying you want? And so that's where I think the nervous system piece comes in because it doesn't have to be something bad for it to feel unfamiliar. Sometimes it's literally just I've never been here before. And so you can really want something and still find yourself weirdly avoiding some of the actions that would actually help you create it. Now, obviously, I don't think every time you don't want like don't do something, there's some deep nervous system reason underneath it, right? I I just people are talking about nervous system all over the place on online at the moment, obviously including me, but I think some of it's a bit like you know, it doesn't have to be that deep sometimes. Sometimes you just don't feel like doing it, sometimes you're tired, sometimes something else came up, and sometimes the thing you keep avoiding is actually something you hate doing. And maybe you need to get someone else to do it, or maybe you need to like put some structure around it so that it's more fun for you for a little bit to do the thing you hate until you actually start loving it, right? Or whatever, you know what I'm talking about, but um you know you're you're stuck or you're feeling stuck, and maybe you need to stop trying to make yourself do it. But if it's something you genuinely want to do, you know how to do it, you know it's important, and you're noticing that you're not doing it again and again and again, I think that's when it's worth getting curious rather than just saying, I'm procrastinating, I need to be more disciplined. Um, my friends, so often it has nothing to do with discipline because again, procrastination is really just describing what's happening, it's not necessarily telling you why, and the why is important. And this is where I think it's really useful for us as coaches as well. Because when a client comes back and hasn't done the thing for the third week in a row, maybe the conversation isn't just okay, how are we going to make sure you do it this week? Maybe we need to understand what actually happens for her when she thinks about doing it. Like, what does she make that action mean? What does she think might happen? What feeling comes up? Is she actually clear on what she's supposed to do? Does she even want to do it? Is there another way she could get the same result? And what happens when she imagines it working? Now, of course, like these are questions we can anticipate and actually prepare our clients for in the future. Um, but sometimes, you know what, it's the first time we're landing here with a client. And so these are really important questions for them and these are important questions for you because I think those are much more interesting questions than just trying to make somebody more accountable. And the saying goes for us, if you've bought another course or program or whatever, you know, to learn something that you basically already know how to do, maybe just stop for a second before you consume another six hours of content and ask yourself, do I actually need more information here or do I need to understand why I'm not using the information I already have? Because I really do think we've become addicted to learning in this industry. And learning is great. I love learning, but learning can also give us this feeling, this really, really lovely feeling that we're doing something without requiring us to actually put anything at risk. I can sit there and learn all day, and at some point I've just got to go and use it. I gotta go and do it. So if you're noticing this in yourself, try the little experiment that I did. Don't make it another thing you have to do every night. Don't turn reverse journaling into your new 17-step morning and evening routine, right? Just try it. Tonight, think about two or three things that you genuinely want to do tomorrow, particularly the things that you know actually matter, and write about tomorrow as though you've already done them. You can write what you did, how it felt, how easily it happened, whatever feels natural to you, and then just leave it and see what happens. Because maybe you don't need another strategy, maybe you don't need another class, maybe you don't need to learn the same thing for the fourth time. Maybe you already know enough. And maybe the more useful question now is why the heck am I not doing what I already know? Because doing isn't everything, but at some point, my friend, it is required. And I think learning how to bridge that gap between knowing and doing, both for ourselves and for our clients, is one of the most useful things we can do or learn to do as coaches. So try it. And if you do, send me a message and tell me what you notice. I'd actually love to know whether you find the same thing I did and if it was helpful for you too. That's it for this week. Lots of love and sunshine. I'll see you next week.