5 Tips To Beat Procrastination & Move Forward in Midlife
I often struggle with procrastination, and I find it one of the most frustrating things to deal with. It’s a normal human trait - something that we all struggle with at different times. Whether you find yourself avoiding something, delaying something or doing one thing while knowing you should be doing something else - it’s all procrastination.
So, this blog is going to cover why we procrastinate, and more importantly, what we can do about it.
Why Does Procrastination Happen?
Firstly, I’ll start by saying that procrastination is not laziness or a character flaw. Rather, it’s a coping mechanism we use to deal with unwanted emotions. When we feel overwhelmed, unsure, bored, stressed, anxious or unmotivated by a task that needs to be done, we procrastinate to avoid those unpleasant feelings. This is completely normal human behaviour.
Often, procrastination happens when we’re unsure how to start something, when we lack clarity around the steps that need to be taken, or when we know the task will be boring or unrewarding (or the reward feels far off in the future and not immediate).
Many women in midlife experience procrastination because they feel stuck or unsure of what they want, not because they don’t want change. A lack of clarity and the thought of moving outside our comfort zones feels heavy and too hard. In the short term, it often feels easier and more comfortable to stay with the status quo.
The good news is, once you understand what’s behind procrastination and perhaps why you do it, it becomes much easier to move through it.
So here are 5 tips on how to overcome procrastination:
Tip #1: Remove distractions
Distractions are the perfect way to KEEP procrastinating because they hijack our attention. Things like our phones, noisy environments, TV and social media provide an easy escape and immediate gratification, making it much easier to avoid what we really need to do.
We can often get so caught up scrolling on our phones or watching something that time passes without us even realising it. Before we know it, an hour has gone by - an hour that could have been used to simply do the thing we’ve been putting off. This can then turn into frustration with ourselves, which leads to even more negative feelings.
So when you need to focus on something, try removing as many distractions as possible. Turn your phone onto silent (or better still, put it in another room), turn off the TV, go to a quiet area where you won’t be disturbed, and set yourself a clear time frame for working on what you want to achieve.
Tip #2: Break It Down Until It Feels Doable and Easy
Our brains resist big, undefined tasks because they feel overwhelming and hard. Taking the time to break tasks down into tiny steps that feel easy and doable removes that overwhelm and lowers the barrier to starting. This creates momentum and confidence - which beats motivation every time.
When you chunk tasks down, they feel much more achievable, rather than focusing on the big, scary overall goal, which can seem so far away.
As well as breaking down the actual goal or task into smaller steps, you can also break your time into smaller chunks. Instead of thinking you need to spend two solid hours on something, try working in 30-minute blocks, with a 5-minute break in between. Again, this reduces feelings of overwhelm and makes it easier to get started.
Would you like some gentle support to get clearer on what you really want and start taking small, meaningful steps forward?
My free Essential Life Reset Checklist for Women Navigating Midlife is a great place to start.
It’s designed to help you slow down, reset, and reconnect with what matters most - so you can move forward with more clarity and confidence.
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Tip #3: Focus on Action Rather than Relying on Motivation
Motivation is unreliable - it comes and goes. If we only did things when we felt motivated, we would never get much done. A common misunderstanding is that we need to feel motivated before we can take action. In reality, motivation often comes after action.
Taking action builds confidence and clarity, which in turn helps us feel more motivated to keep going. Taking action over perfection is also important. Perfection can mean feeling like we need to do things flawlessly, or that everything needs to be perfectly aligned before we start. The truth is, none of us do things perfectly, and it’s very rare for all the ducks to be neatly lined up at the “perfect” time.
Don’t wait to feel ready - act to create readiness.
One simple way to do this is by using a strategy called the 3-2-1-GO Rule. When you notice yourself procrastinating, say to yourself “3-2-1-GO” and then immediately take action. It can be something small, but as we’ve talked about, often starting is the biggest barrier. This strategy helps you move straight through that barrier.
Tip #4: Reduce Overwhelm by Choosing One Thing
We all know how it feels when we’ve got a million things on our to-do list - it feels extremely overwhelming. I know when this happens to me, I tend to waste time and energy just thinking about what to do first. Too many priorities can often lead to paralysis. When everything feels urgent, procrastination increases.
Spending a few minutes working out which goals or tasks are more important than others, and giving them a bit of a ranking, can really help you decide where to start. Break your to-do list into three parts:
Must Do
Important But Not Urgent
Would Be Nice To Do
Then start by choosing one thing from your Must Do list. Choose one task and focus on that for a given time. If you finish all your Must Do’s, move to the Important But Not Urgent tasks. And if you manage to get to the Would Be Nice To Do tasks - amazing!!
Depending on what you get done during the day, you can then re-arrange the list for the next day. Something that was in the Important But Not Urgent section might now move to the Must Do section. This simple process can really reduce overwhelm and help you take clear, focused action.
Tip #5: Just do 5 minutes
When you commit to just five minutes on something, you’ll often find that you end up spending much longer than five minutes on it. This is another great trick to reduce overwhelm. By telling yourself you’re only going to do five minutes, your brain registers that this is such a short amount of time - and completely doable. It becomes easy.
Often you get on a roll and find yourself actually moving forward for much longer than five minutes, which helps create momentum, progress, and a real sense of achievement. And if you only do five minutes, so be it - it’s five minutes more than you had done!
You could even combine the 3-2-1-GO Rule with this five-minute rule to really kick procrastination in the butt!
I often use this strategy, and it works. Even if I have to say to myself every time, “just do five minutes,” before I know it, I’m making progress and it gets easier.
At the end of the day, even when we understand why we’re procrastinating, the only way to move through it is to take some sort of action. It can be tiny, but doing something - anything - to get the ball rolling makes a huge difference.
What I really want you to know is that procrastination is completely normal and something we all experience. It’s not about creating a life where it never comes up. It’s about recognising when it shows up and having simple strategies you can use to move through it with more ease.
Is procrastination something that’s been holding you back from change, achieving your goals, or reaching your potential?
If you’d like deeper, personalised support - you can learn more about my Dream It… Plan It… Do It… life and mindset coaching program on my website.
This is where we work together to create clarity, shift mindset patterns, and turn intention into consistent action - with support, accountability and guidance along the way.
So take a moment to reflect:
Which of these tips resonated most?
Where do you notice procrastination showing up in your life right now?
What’s one small step you could take today?