| My procrastination is basically an anxiety problem. How do I deal with it now and stay somewhat sane? Most importantly I do a lot of working on my self-awareness, and recognizing when I'm not in control. Next would be medication so I can actually do something when I hit that realization. I'm fine without it until the stress hits and then it's too late. I've considered that maybe it's a placebo effect thing, but at this point I don't really care. I don't have horrible side effects or feel weird or anything I can't live with. I have to be extremely honest about myself all the time. If I'm behind, I say so. If I'm stressed I say so. It rarely bites me and it keeps me from having to scramble to cover a lie or exaggeration. Anxiety feeds on anxiety. Then there's all that agile bullcrap. I try to think in 1 or 2 week sprints depending on the project. Occasionally I look up to see what my bigger goals are and make sure my small ones make progress towards them. I have to work in a supportive team, so we keep each other on track and in perspective. We have to be able to cross-delegate so we don't get bogged down. It's way more fun to share in success and failure with friends. I get killed by long-term deadlines. Give me 6 months and I'll turn a shell script into a new language project. So I ignore the "cure world hunger" stuff and just make sure I'm making progress all the time. That way I enjoy my success rather than constantly feeling like I'll never make utopia. I focus on MVP, then MVP + 1, and so on. I never fall in love with my own work or some piece of tech, so I'm happy to scrap it when it stops being useful. Now I get a lot done. I have a reputation for getting a lot done in short periods of time. But I still always have to combat the feeling that I'm not moving fast enough and I'm letting people down. Talking with people who care about you (because they're friends, your spouse, or you're paying them to help) is the only way to really deal with that. I guess the common themes here are to be self-aware, communicate, and keep moving forward in as small iterations as is reasonable. |