ADHD Procrastination: Irrational Thoughts Keep Us Paralyzed

How fear keeps us procrastinating

Everybody – ADHDer or not – procrastinates. But ADHD procrastination is significantly higher and with more profound consequences. This is because those with ADHD procrastinate most on the toughest tasks. These tend to be what we most need to be doing. If we had our own country, it would be called the ProcrastiNATION!

The good news is, most ADHD procrastination is the result of mental barriers built on the ILLUSION that we can’t or don’t know how to do the tough stuff. There are three main barriers:

Fear

Fear is a powerful emotion. You fear that you won’t know how to do it (or do it right) or that it will take too long. You may fear the impending frustration and unpleasantness or perhaps some confrontation involved in the doing.

Disorganization

You don’t know which project to start with or even where to start with that project. So, you don’t…start…anything. NOT rational.

Indifference

You don’t feel the urgency. Nothing is compelling for you to attack. Even if you KNOW it needs to get done and how to do it, motivation doesn’t strike until the 11th hour when it’s crisis mode.

Fear as a Barrier to Action

A wise man once said, “Ninety percent of all perceived fears are imaginary. The other ten percent are ours to transmute.” Or in other words, ours to crush.

Fear’s a funny thing. We let fear keep us from moving on a necessary but tough task. We wait and wait thinking (fantasizing, really) that the task will somehow evaporate or become less intimidating. It doesn’t of course. Then, ultimately, the task snowballs into a potential calamity. Soon enough, the fear of the calamity drags us kicking and screaming into that long-postponed action.

A particular kind of fear is perfectionism. This is a major barrier to action for ADDers. Perfectionism is the FEAR of not having a perfect outcome. And the expectation of a perfect outcome is a lot of needless, irrational nonsense with which we burden ourselves.

Overcoming fear and moving through ADHD procrastination

Ask yourself this: Just how painful ARE these things compared to real, actual pain like burning your hand on a hot pan? In comparison, there is no real pain associated with what you are scared of doing. You are paralyzed by imaginary pain. Pain and being uncomfortable aren’t the same.

Then think of all the times you dreaded something and put it off until the absolute last minute. What USUALLY happened? You DID it. You accomplished the task. So again, the fear was just imagined. You were rescued by the fear of the consequences of NOT doing it.

When fear starts to take over your thoughts, remind yourself that you CAN do this. You HAVE done this.

Say it out loud if it helps. Look yourself in the mirror and say, “I’m going to do this now.” Release the chains of fear that are keeping ADHD procrastination attached to your goals.

We’ll be covering disorganization and indifference in future posts. But fear is certainly the biggest part of the ADHD procrastination puzzle. If you’d like to overcome and challenge this irrational fear, our Stop Procrastinating group program is perfect for you. Learn more about it today (four sessions for only $79!).