Areas › Focus, starting, and ADHD › Bringing the future closer
Nobody decides well mid-panic. So cutting the number of panics is itself a way of making better decisions, even if nothing about your judgement changes at all.
It is slow work and it is usually the real work: fewer things said yes to, earlier starts, deadlines negotiated before they are sitting on top of you. You will not feel any cleverer for it. You will notice that the choices you make on an ordinary Tuesday are better than the ones you used to make on a Thursday night.
Qur’an and Sunnah
'Provide well for yourselves: the best provision is to be mindful of God' (Quran 2:197). Provision is something gathered before the journey, not scrambled for in the middle of it.
ٱلۡحَجُّ أَشۡهُرࣱ مَّعۡلُومَٰتࣱۚ فَمَن فَرَضَ فِيهِنَّ ٱلۡحَجَّ فَلَا رَفَثَ وَلَا فُسُوقَ وَلَا جِدَالَ فِي ٱلۡحَجِّۗ وَمَا تَفۡعَلُواْ مِنۡ خَيۡرࣲ يَعۡلَمۡهُ ٱللَّهُۗ وَتَزَوَّدُواْ فَإِنَّ خَيۡرَ ٱلزَّادِ ٱلتَّقۡوَىٰۖ وَٱتَّقُونِ يَٰٓأُوْلِي ٱلۡأَلۡبَٰبِ
The pilgrimage takes place during the prescribed months. There should be no indecent speech, misbehaviour, or quarrelling for anyone undertaking the pilgrimage- whatever good you do, God is well aware of it. Provide well for yourselves: the best provision is to be mindful of God- always be mindful of Me, you who have understanding
Qur’an 2:197read it in the library
Translation: M.A.S. Abdel Haleem, The Qur'an, Oxford University Press, 2004.
What the research says
A review of the procrastination research identifies the delay before an incentive arrives, alongside how aversive the task is and how big the incentive is, as the task features that most reliably produce putting things off. That points at arranging conditions rather than at trying harder inside them. It is a review, so it gathers what has been found rather than testing a programme of change.
Zhang S, Liu P, Feng T. (2019). To do it now or later: The cognitive mechanisms and neural substrates underlying procrastination.. Wiley interdisciplinary reviews. Cognitive science doi
Strength of evidence: one line of research. A single study, or a theoretical account.
Why it works
Good judgement needs decent conditions more than it needs effort.
This one is still a draft. It is waiting on a scholar and a clinician to read it before it is published.
Near this one
Two things depend on the same small gap: looking back at how the last one went, and looking ahead at how this one is likely to go. Neither can happen once you are already moving.
A report due Friday puts a little pressure on somebody else's Monday. For you Monday feels like nothing at all, and then Thursday evening arrives carrying the whole of it.
Put the stake outside your own head. Tell a colleague that if you are late to the meeting, lunch is on you.