[otikik]

On the medium term, get professional help, if you can afford it.

On the short term, it might help understanding what’s going on: your brain’s more animal part is trying to protect you from a perceived danger. That’s actually a good thing, most of the time.

Ways to overcome it: they depend a lot on your personality. Ask people who know you about this. In my case, what works is splitting the task into minimal steps.

For example:

1. Sit down in front of the computer

2. Turn off wifi (avoid distractions)

3. Open text editor

4. Write Essay Title

5. Write Abstract

6. Write Index

…

This works for me because my animal might see Write Essay as a tiger about to eat me, but Write Title is fine. Instinct can be stupid like that sometimes lol.

When you have more time, the book Atomic Habits coul also help you, but that’s more long term.