Haunting Your Old Habits: How to Bury Procrastination Before It Comes Back From the Dead
Picture this: You sit down to write that report, but suddenly you’re cleaning your entire kitchen, reorganizing the spice rack, and Googling “how many ghosts are legally allowed in one haunted house.” Congratulations—you’ve just been possessed… by procrastination.
Procrastination isn’t just a bad habit. It’s a zombie. You think you’ve killed it, buried it six feet deep, and yet—there it is again, knocking at your brain at 2 a.m., whispering, “Pssst… TikTok?”
But fear not, brave soul. Today we’re holding a séance for our bad habits. Here’s how to bury procrastination once and for all (before it claws its way back from the grave).
1. Identify the Ghost in the Room
Every haunting starts with an origin story. Your procrastination is no different. Is it fear of failure? Fear of success? Or just an unhealthy attachment to Netflix?
Call it out. Expose it. Like any good horror flick, naming the demon is step one to banishing it.
2. Garlic and Deadlines
Vampires hate garlic. Procrastination hates deadlines. And not vague “someday” deadlines, but real ones.
Pro tip: Trick yourself with micro-deadlines. Instead of “finish the project,” make it “draft the intro by 2:00 p.m.” Suddenly the monster shrinks from Godzilla to gremlin size.
3. Stake Through the Heart = Action in 5 Minutes
Here’s the secret: you don’t kill procrastination by waiting for motivation. You kill it by moving.
Commit to 5 minutes. Write for 5 minutes. Clean for 5 minutes. More often than not, momentum takes over, and suddenly you’re sprinting away from the monster instead of waiting to be eaten.
4. Salt the Doorways (aka Remove Temptation)
You can’t fight off a ghost while inviting it in for tea. Same with procrastination. If your phone is the demon summoning circle, exile it. Put it in another room. Delete the app. Salt your doorways, metaphorically speaking, and watch procrastination lose its power.
5. Celebrate Your Survival
Every time you beat procrastination, treat it like surviving a horror movie. Dance around. Light a candle. Give yourself a prize. (Just maybe not candy corn. That’s basically edible wax.)
Celebrating small wins creates positive feedback—so next time, instead of haunting you, action becomes the treat.
The Final Exorcism
Procrastination thrives in the dark. But once you shine a flashlight on it—name it, shrink it, outsmart it—it loses its teeth.
So grab your metaphorical garlic, your stakes, and your courage. This Halloween, the only thing that should haunt you… is how amazing it feels to finally get stuff done.