The Hidden Reason You Keep Putting Things Off | Jon Acuff
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What is the main reason people procrastinate?
So there's something most of us have been putting off. Maybe it's a project, a creative pursuit, a conversation, a chapter you've been meaning to write. I mean, literally or figuratively. And here's the thing. You probably already know what it is. It's been with you for a while. You've thought about it. Maybe you've gotten excited about it. And still, somehow, it keeps not happening. I have been there and I will be again. I think most of us have. And my guest today, an old friend, John Acuff, has spent years studying exactly this. And he's really arrived at a take that honestly surprised me. Procrastination, he says, is not actually a problem. It's a solution, just not a very good one. And when you understand what it's actually solving for, everything about how you approach the work you care most about changes.
John is a New York Times bestselling author of 11 books, including Finnish and Soundtracks, which have together sold over a million copies. His newest is procrastination proof. Never get stuck again. He's also one of Inc. Top 100 leadership speakers and someone who brings a rare combination of just deep research and genuine warmth to a topic that most of us take very personally. In our conversation, we get into what he calls the four permissions that most of us are waiting for without realizing it. Why desire creates discipline and not the other way around, and what it actually looks like to finally close the gap between who you intend to be and what you actually do each day. So excited to share this conversation with you.
I'm Jonathan Fields, and this is Good Life Project. You share a story about how you used to listen to one particular song over and over and over in your car. Take me into that.
Yeah. So I went through this for probably a year. I was listening to Colin Hay, who's the lead singer of Men at Work. Land Down Under was their biggest hit in the 80s. He has a song called Waiting for My Real Life to Begin. And I felt like I was in a rut. And I guess I thought, why don't I just dig it deeper? and listen to a musical version of it constantly. And it's a beautifully written song, but it's not helpful in the sense of the main character is just waiting. Like he's looking over the horizon.
How can understanding procrastination change your approach?
He's waiting for the phone to ring. He's going to slay the dragon someday. And every day he gets up and it's like the same exact thing. And I felt like I was stuck in that own loop in my life. And so I, yeah, I probably listened to that song hundreds and hundreds of times that year.
Yeah. I mean, in your case, What was the waiting that was resonating with you? Like when you're listening to that over and over and over. All right. So, you know, I happen to be a huge Man at Work fan. Great songs, great musicality. He's got a very cool voice. But still, like, what were you waiting for?
I was waiting. I mean, part of it was I felt like I had ideas worth sharing and I didn't know how to do it. So I felt like I was waiting for the internet to catch up with what I wanted to say. Meaning like, I don't have a platform. I have all these ideas. I mean, I think my wife once said to me, it's hard living with a writer who isn't writing. And I think that's true of most crafts. It's hard living with a painter who's not painting. It's hard living with a woodworker who's not woodworking. And so I felt like I look back on my life and go, man, this is my 11th book. The 12th comes out. I've got another one coming out this year and later this year. Like where were all those words going before they had a home?
Like you talk about a frustrated, you know, log jammed writer. Like I had all these things to say and all these questions to ask and all these threads to pull. And I wasn't, and I didn't know what to do with that. So I felt really kind of like,
creatively constipated in that moment i think that's what i was waiting for was like where is an outlet where is an audience where is a chance where is there a microphone yeah i mean i think that probably resonates with so many people like maybe you're not a writer but whatever it is there's a pressure that builds i think inside all of us there's an impulse that we all have to do something to invest our energy in a particular way um we often deny that it's there i don't
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Chapters
8 chapters
1
What is the main reason people procrastinate?
0:00–2:20
2
How can understanding procrastination change your approach?
2:20–4:21
3
What are the four permissions we need to give ourselves?
4:21–4:34
4
How does desire influence discipline?
4:34–5:03
5
What are the broken soundtracks that affect our productivity?
5:03–5:17
6
What does 'the opposite of procrastination' look like?
5:17–6:59
7
How do we shift from procrastination to action?
6:59–9:07
8
What steps can we take to create sustainable habits?
9:07–52:21
Speakers
2 identifiedMore from Good Life Project
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