Today, Do That One Thing You’ve Been Putting Off

Today, Do That One Thing You’ve Been Putting Off

By Tim Herrera

Like any modern office worker, my inbox every so often becomes an unwieldy(ˌənˈwēldē) mess(mes) of unanswered(ˌənˈansərd) emails, half-written messages that need to be sent and more “Sorry I’m so late getting back to you!” notes than I ever thought I’d write. It’s usually(ˈyo͞oZHo͞oəlē) fine, we all manage(ˈmanij), that’s life.

But every so often, I have that one email I need to write but that I just can’t force myself to take care of. You know the type: It’s something you have anxiety(aNGˈzī-itē) about even after leaving the office, and you know you’re making it worse the longer you put it off. Maybe it’s not even an email. Maybe it’s a memo(ˈmemō) you have to write, a phone call you have to make, a meeting you have to set up, or whatever else.

I’m taking a wild(wīld) guess here, but you probably(ˈpräblē,ˈpräbəblē
) thought(THôt) of one specific thing on your to-do list while reading that last paragraph(ˈparəˌgraf), right?

Psychologists(sīˈkäləjist) call this kind of avoidance(əˈvoid) self-sabotage(ˈsabəˌtäZH): It’s when we put off or ignore(igˈnôr) a situation or task to our own detriment(ˈdetrəmənt) because doing it would force us to confront(kənˈfrənt) our fears(fi(ə)r) or anxieties(aNGˈzī-itē). This often manifests(ˈmanəˌfest) itself in extreme(ikˈstrēm) procrastination(prō-,prəˌkrastəˈnāSHən) (not that I’ve ever had problems with that), and there are many reasons we fall into these patterns(ˈpatərn).

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https://www.nytimes.com/2018/03/05/smarter-living/today-do-that-one-thing-youve-been-putting-off.html