The Chris Voss Show - The Chris Voss Show Podcast – How To Be A Better Procrastinator (Super Achievers Series) by Patrick Sanaghan Ed.D

Episode Date: October 9, 2023

How To Be A Better Procrastinator (Super Achievers Series) by Patrick Sanaghan Ed.D https://amzn.to/48NlpUW Procrastination has a cost. It costs the world billions of dollars a year in lost productivity. Lost money and lost time that can never be recovered. Let's face it. We all procrastinate in some ways. This book is not designed to eliminate procrastination. It was written to help minimize the negative effects and to make you a better procrastinator. Author Patrick Sanaghan is an expert in the field of organizational leadership. With thirty years of experience, he has worked with scores of organizations in the corporate and non profit arena including numerous Fortune 500 companies. He's taught thousands of leaders how to improve their organizational skills, strategic planning, and transitions. If you're thinking about putting off buying or reading this book, then it's definitely for you!

You wanted the best. You've got the best podcast, the hottest podcast in the world. The Chris Voss Show, the preeminent podcast with guests so smart you may experience serious brain bleed. The CEOs, authors, thought leaders, visionaries, and motivators. Get ready, get ready, strap yourself in. Keep your hands, arms, and legs inside the vehicle at all times, because you're about to go on a monster education roller coaster with your brain. Now, here's your host, Chris Voss. Hi, folks. It's Voss here from thechrisvossshow.com, thechrisvossshow.com.

Welcome to the big show, my family and friends. We certainly appreciate you guys having us. Over into your earbuds, those ears that you have that bring in all the sound and the wonderfulness of The Chris Voss Show, the Chris Voss Show family that loves you but doesn't judge you. As always, we have the most smartest authors, brilliant minds on the show. For 15 years, three to four shows a day, 10 to 15, 20 shows a week. We bring you some of the most amazing minds and authors

and then just little old me with the mic. Go to goodreads.com, 4ChessChristmas, linkedin.com, 4ChessChristmas, youtube.com, 4ChessChristmas, and all those crazy places on the internet. Keep those five-star reviews coming. We love seeing them on the iTunes. It's so great. Just go over there on the iTunes, put in for a uh a five star review and we just love them man i just sit and cry when i

when i see you and i go thank you people love you you know we've seen podcasts where they buy like all the uh all the reviews not like 20 episodes and 500 reviews and we don't do that so please please for the love of god go give us a review uh we have an amazing gentleman on this show joins us today he's written a really cool book with a really cool title that i like and i may be a part of the cult uh it is called how to be a better procrastinator this is part of his super achiever series. Patrick Shanahan is on the book with us or on the podcast today with us on his book that came out May 23rd, 2023. We're going to be talking to him and he is the president of the Shanahan group that plays in

the higher education space and nonprofit sector. His focus is on leadership development, leadership transitions, and building great teams. He's the author or co-author of around 12 different books and 50 published articles. Welcome to the show, Patrick. How are you? Really good, Chris. Good to be here. Good to have you as well. Give us your.com so people can find you on the interwebs, please.

Sure. It's the Sanahan Group, S-A-N-A-G-H-A-N, one word, sanahangroup.com. And that'll take you to a website with a lot of good information. There you go. So you've written 12 different books and 50 different articles. Awesome sauce. And so this is your latest book. Give us, why'd you decide to write this one?

Yeah, it's a great question. I've been on the road about 175 days a year for 20 years. It sounds like I work as hard as you do. And then COVID hit and I found myself not traveling as much and had a lot more time on my hands than I ever imagined. And I was sitting in my office and I had four books of articles and papers and cutouts of the topic procrastination because I used to be a pretty bad procrastinator. I still procrastinate on a couple of things.

But I said to myself, well, listen, I've learned a lot, made a lot of mistakes, and I'm better at managing my procrastination. I put together a book and it's what I've done. And it's a very practical, very accessible Very sensible book There you go So you've taken and put together the book Give us a 30,000 overview of what's inside And how we can all be better procrastinators

The book is written for procrastinators And so You can start anywhere in the book The last chapter has 10 lessons. There's a one on procrastination hacks is another one. There's one about the research. Some people are interested in doing the research and psychological research on procrastination. So you can open the book in the first five, six pages, you'll get four or five strategies on how to handle or manage your procrastination, but you can start anywhere. There you go.

And so is it kind of a play on words? I mean, it does say in the byline, over 101 strategies to help you manage your procrastination habit. Who are these procrastinator people, and why do they always procrastinate? Well, about 20% to 25% of the adult population in this country are chronic procrastinators. It's a lifestyle. So that's tens of millions of people.

And there's a good chance you either know somebody or work with somebody that really got procrastination as a bad habit. And it costs procrastinators in their emotional health, like in stress, anxiety, and overwhelm. They put things off. They know they shouldn't do, but they still do. And this cycle just continues over and over and over again. And they pay a price for it. I like how you say it's a lifestyle. It sounds like I've joined a cult or something.

I'm in the past in a cult. But why is it a lifestyle? Is there something that causes this behavior? Were we dropped as children or something? No, it wasn't that. Is this a DNA thing where, I don't know, I inherited something from my parents? No, there's no research that shows it's genetic in nature. What it is really is there's usually a task to do that you don't want to do.

It's something noxious or aggravating or overwhelming. And what happens is our feelings start to say, oh my God, I can't do this. I'm getting stressed. I'm getting anxiety. And the minute you step away from doing the task, and that's the key, you step away from doing the task. I'm not doing it right now. Oh, all those emotions just disappear. All those, you know, friction, anxiety, and that's the hook. Because I walk away. Intellectually, I might say, oh, I still got to do that. But that's intellectually. But emotionally, I feel relief and no stress, and that's what keeps it going.

That's what keeps it going. Ah. So do we need to go back to a logical response? Or, well, you have several different ways to deal with this. So tease us out some of the ways that we can uh utilize being a better procrastinator so i suppose i'm sorry i was gonna say i suppose identifying that we have that problem is the first step yeah that's the first step you know ask your friends they will tell you right away right because you don't show up on time you don't do this you say hey i'm sick today they'll tell right away, or your spouse or your partner. And so

you get some feedback. But how this kind of started for me was I was writing a dissertation 30 odd years ago and I wasn't writing it. I was reading it, which is a nice sophisticated form of procrastination. I kept on researching, researching, researching and my board chair said,

buddy, you got to start writing this thing or you're out of here. And I got in a one year extension and he would meet with me and say, Pat, you got to start writing this thing or you're out of here. And I got in a one-year extension. And he would meet with me and say, Pat, you got to start writing. And what I did is it was one of the smartest things I've done in my life. I asked some colleagues who had already finished their dissertation. I said, how the heck do you do it? And they all had these little strategies that I never even thought about. And the three that I adopted were this.

And I think there are three core ones that people can kind of hear it and get it. First one is to make your progress visible somehow. If you've read five pages, written five pages, cleaned out of the corner of the garage, painted one side of the house, make your progress visible somehow. And what I do in my life is I have an agenda every day with six things on on it we'll talk a little bit about that and every time i do something i have a big black marker and i score it out so i can see it from a distance that i've accomplished something and that that's what i mean by making your progress visible i really i really like this because i have one of those tasks on my computer and number one i never turn it on but it's on my phone too i mean if there's something like

really important i gotta do that day like a birthday or something it'll ping me and i have my appointments on my calendar that's different but you know i have this task thing and i i was like i'm gonna do these tasks but i like this yellow pad idea i really do it's very simple it's very visual and you get to see it and go, eh. Because I always, even if I do a task that's on my computer task list. Right. It doesn't feel. I never cross.

But I like this because I'm like, I got to push some stuff today. And then the problem I have is I'll think of something I need to do, like a task. And I'll be like, I need to put that in the computer task list. Or maybe I'm driving or something, or maybe I'm just, I don't know, I might be playing a video game or doing editing on the thing. And then I'm like, okay, I got to do this. And then you turn on the phone and you're like, oh, something's on fire in New York City in politics.

And you're like, oh, I better read that first before I put that task in. I like this. I'm going to get me a yellow pad today. You have sold me on this. I'm going to get a yellow pad today and sit right on the thing. Then I've got to find a pen. Sometimes he's talking to the smartphone.

I've tried that. You know what happens to that stuff? Same thing happens to the computer. I'm old fashioned. I know what happens to that stuff? Same thing happens to the computer. Yeah, I'm old-fashioned. I do a lot of paper stuff. I like it. I like it. I'm doing it. Because then it sits right there on the table, and I'll have to look at that pad. Here's another one I use. I use work in about 30-minute chunks, and your lifestyle seems to be a little bit different.

I have a little control over the structure. I used to be able to work an hour at a time when i was younger can't do that anymore so now i do 30 minute chunks and i get post-its right 10 or 12 post-its and each one represents a 30 minute work chunk and i put it on a wall a whiteboard across from my desk when i do my 30 minutes i stand up and someone taught me this it's unbelievable i go and i wrinkle up one of those post-its and throw it in the trash and you're like winning it feels like you hit a home run or a great swing in the golf course i love it is you can see the post-its get less and less and less your motivation gets more and more and more so that's another technique you can use that's really for me it's very powerful. The other thing I wanted to mention is exactly,

you got to write stuff down because our heads are not storage mechanisms, like they're thinking mechanisms. And the more you can get into discipline of just writing it down on a poster or a piece of paper, that's just really good. I don't use computers for this kind of work. And I work in a very, you know, high intense environment like you do, but everything's paper for me. And that's what I like. There you go. You know, and, and that was the problem I found years ago. I used to have really, uh, kind of high anxiety, ADHD, and I would lay in bed at night thinking about what work I needed to do the next morning. And I would drive myself crazy because I wouldn't go to sleep and then I wouldn't be able to function well the next morning. And what I didn't realize was it was my brain constantly reminding me of stuff.

I think I saw somebody like your brain's trying to, you know, re rejigger your mind so that you can remember. And that's why it's repeating everything because it knows you're probably going to forget because you're an idiot. And, uh, so I, uh, so I, I took and I took and started writing stuff down, and that made all the difference because then I didn't have to think about it anymore. I'm like, wow, my mind is cleared. I can go to take a nap. Absolutely.

The other thing I already kind of talked about, the chewable chunks is a lot of people get caught into, I've got to sit down and just punch this thing out. Chewable chunks, just do it in 10-minute increments. That's all you have to do is 10 minutes at a time over a couple of hours, you'll get a lot done. So you don't have to sit down and grind yourself because recastellers will not do that.

Chillable chunks is really a way to go. And then the third thing I learned from that dissertation thing, and I resisted it, Chris, tremendously, was rewards work. And I said to my colleagues, do I need rewards? Shouldn't I be more mature than that? And they said, what are you, nuts? Rewards are really effective. And every one of them had what they called reward maps.

So if they finished a chapter or finished a section, they would do something really special for themselves, and it motivated them tremendously. So those three things, rewards map, rewards work. Rewards map.wards work Rewards map Wow I've never heard of that term That's pretty brilliant You have to have a variety

You just don't say I'll sip a beer after every 30 minutes It could be a latte, it could be a walk with a friend It could be reading a mystery What's really dangerous is go on social media For that 10 minute break in between Because you start reading about China And flowers and gorillas And three hours later you say boy did I learn anything so you've got to really stay away from social

media there you go you know that's not a reward people that's a punishment actually uh but i love this the reward map whiteboards and you can you can create they actually sell uh whiteboards that you can pre-buy that has a reward chart on, it looks like Pinterest. I Googled that. But I like this idea. I like where there's steps to the reward because, you know, trying to be accountable and stuff is just extraordinary. But I love this.

This is brilliant. Yep. Rewards work. And like I said, I resisted it, but they all said, don't be silly. It really does work. Because you look forward to it. Yeah, because you've got something at the end of the goal. You're not just slaving away going,

I've got to do this thing you're not really excited to do. And, you know, just go do it or else, you know. It's like Mikey, they're just like, just do it. And you're just like, I don't want to do it. I don't want to do it. That's true. I don't want to do it. So you've got to figure out what can I do to get started.

And that's the hardest part for procrastinators is getting started. So you got to make starting easy, as easy as you can. I like this way. You know, I'll be like, Hey, if you do this, you can go get a good burger and fries or something. There you go. That'll work. You know, for a two minute test for that, right? But you can do a three minute or 45 minute task and say, okay, the burger's coming with fries and the milkshake.

Absolutely will work. Maybe you'll have a summation, like if you do all six of these things today, you get a burger tonight or something like that. Yeah, that would be probably good because you don't want to have a burger every other hour. I know. Or a shot of whiskey, for that matter.

It'll be pretty messed up by the end of the day. Yeah, but you could do it at the end of the day yeah yeah but you could do it at the end of the day you can treat yourself a glass of wine or a latte or whatever it is there you go and and celebrate yourself um no i love this uh and this is a better way because i have a procrastination problem and we talked to in the green room about i did a joke with you about how how uh the scientific term for my procrastination is just being a lazy bastard um but you you had some scientific knowledge on what the difference is between someone who's lazy and someone who's a procrastinator tell us about that yeah that's a

great differentiator chris because a lot of people think that procrastinators are lazy and most of them are not procrastinators suffer a lot of anxiety, a lot of guilt, a lot of stress. Lazy people don't have those emotions. They couldn't care less. And I said, my buddy is a very talented guy, and he has never lost a

minute of sleep because he didn't do something. He just says, oh, we'll get to it tomorrow. So that's the differentiator. They really don't have those kinds of negative emotions that we have. I might fall into that category of lazy then. I'm not a progressor. I'm lazy. But at least now I know what I is.

Knowing what I is. I am what I am. Knowing what I am. It kind of helps. So there you go. Oh, man. Wow. Yeah, I have a bad habit of procrastinating what I need to do and then pulling the whole college test last minute.

Do it all. Get it all done. And that can be one of those challenges that i i need to work on um that's a great piece of information because most of the research on procrastination real rigorous scientific research you know is done with college students oh really well because you got you got 15 you know semester 15 weeks of the semester sometimes it's 10 in different campuses and you can track progress and what they found about 90 of the time is the professor or the faculty member says okay you need to finish these three papers by the end of the

semester and nothing happens for about what for the first 14 weeks and then week 15 they go oh my lord and they start working and they get stressed out smoking cigarettes drinking too much doing all-nighters and they finally get it done, and usually their grades suffer because they didn't get a chance to do the quality control or edit it very well. You can suffer a whole grade. So if you want to get an A and you do things at the last minute, you're probably going to end up with a B.

There you go. And you talk about how billions and billions of dollars are wasted in basically people procrastinating and procrastinating companies as well, I suppose. Absolutely. There was a study in 2002 that a half a billion dollars of income tax, right? Late payments goes to the IRS because of people like me and you.

Oh, wow. I believe the tax code is designed for procrastinators because it can get overwhelming very quickly and they keep on putting it off and putting it off. And I was a younger guy, about 25, 27. I used to pay penalties even after I got an extension, and it cost me financially. Credit card payments are late. I'm not going to the doctor because, oh, I can do it next week. Getting colonoscopies, next year.

And so you can hurt your health and your wealth. That's true. And there's probably a lot of people that do that, uh, where they, they, uh, screw themselves up pretty freaking bad. Uh, I might be one of those people that, uh, you know, you, you put your health off and you don't take care of your health and, you know, you should go in for regular checkups. And I just go off. I just go in whenever like a body part falls off right right you bleed like oh that that looks like i'm gonna have to sew that back on i don't have so good but uh doesn't look like the duct tape's gonna work this time for getting that duct taped back on so uh there you go um and these are great over 101 strategies um so what made you want to write this book on procrastination why did why was this a thing for you yeah most of

the books i i've written over the years i was a former school teacher and principal and in a heart i'm a teacher and try to make people's lives a little bit easier and i've dealt with a lot of senior leaders in higher education i've done stuff at google and apple and some of those fancy places too general electric and these very high-powered people a lot of times you have to know a little bit and they realize they put off decision making which is another form of procrastination until they have more information and more data and more analysis i realize that's a form of procrastination just like my reading my dissertation is a lot of senior leaders will delay and delay and delay when they kind of know in their

heart or their instincts i've got to cut bait here and move things forward so it became a kind of a fascinating thing to listen to them and say here's some strategies that you can do to be lessen your procrastination there you go i think what i'm going to do is I'm going to use the yellow pad for, like, from day to day, there's stuff that really needs to get done. And then I need to do today. It's like the need to do stuff. You know what I mean? And it's like, you have to get this

done today. There's just, you know, and sometimes I'll put that off and be like, yeah, I'll do that in a few hours. And then, you know, I've got my task list on the computer. I'm looking at it now i need to figure out how to make this thing so that auto loads whenever i load my computer i use i think it's microsoft task or uh the windows task um and uh the problem is i never open it i just never do and uh that's one of the problems so i don't really look at them. And about the only time I look at it is if I go, oh, I need to add a task to this.

And then I go in and I'm like, hey, look at all these stuff. You get overwhelmed. Real quick advice on that. And for years I used to do 10 things a day. I don't know where I got that notion, but a lot of professionals do that, the top 10, the top 10, the top 10. And now we get to like seven and maybe eight, which is a lot. And I would feel like a failure.

I didn't get the nine and 10. And I'm talking to a colleague of mine and saying, you know, I just feel frustrated. And he says, why would you have 10 things to do, important things to do every day? I said, well, to have that? He said, I only do five. And he was a lot more successful than I was.

I said, you only do five? He says, Pat, cut it in half, cut only do five. And he was a lot more successful than I was. I said, you only do five? He says, Pat, cut it in half. Cut it in half. And I was reluctant to do it, but I tried it because, you know, he's a smart guy. If you do five pretty important things a day, you're world class. And the other thing that happens sometimes is if you do five or six, you don't get the number six. Then you add it to the list. Then you have seven tomorrow. And the next day you have eight or nine. That's don't get the number six. Then you add it to the list, and then you have seven tomorrow,

and the next day you have eight or nine. That's not the way to do it. You have to discipline and say, the five things I need to do today and possibly a sixth. It's a game changer. It's a game changer. Definitely, definitely. I like this.

You're going to get me more organized with this book and everything. Hopefully. Because this is, hopefully. So I'm going to try not to say, well, I'm going to put, I'm going to get that book and read it tomorrow. Right. But if you just do one thing, that's the key. One of the things about procrastinators is we're over-aspirational

and we hear a bunch of ideas and say, oh, we're going to try this and this and this and this. If you do one thing, if you do the yellow sheet of paper with your agenda, that's a home run. That's a home run. I think it will be. And I like it because it'll sit here on my desk because I get spacey and I'm like, what am I supposed to do?

And, you know, you start reading social media. You know, we're on social media. It's part of the way we market the business. So it's really easy to go on there and you're like, what's going on in Zimbabwe? And you're like, and you're down this wormhole. And then like an hour later, you're like, I've been looking at my phone for an hour. TikTok's the worst for that. So there you go.

These are pretty insightful. Tell us about your journey, and let's get a plug in for some of your other books. I know you've done some books on leadership and some other things as well. Yeah, I've done some work on presidential transitions. It's something I have some expertise in. In higher education, a lot of you get a new leader coming in and making sure he or she really is connected to the people and the culture, understand the history. And it goes way beyond logistics. You really got to design processes to make sure that they get known. People want to know who the leader is quickly.

And then the other thing is people don't tend about leaving. We don't like ending. So the person who's leaving sometimes just kind of quietly ekes out, and that's not good. I mean, if you're a president of an institution, you want to make sure the leaving part is elevated and the work is very honored. So I've done three or four books on presidential transitions.

I've done some work on high-performing teams. I just have a book on creativity, and this is a great title, by the way. I think it is, Chris, is Climbing Bubbles, How to Increase Your Creative IQ. We just finished the book on creativity And this is a great title by the way, I think it is Chris Is Climbing Bubbles How to Increase Your Creative IQ We just finished that book Oh really, and is it coming out soon? It's going to come out soon, yes

It'll come out next week or two So it's a great, once again A very practical Doable, you can read a couple pages Oh, that's one way I can enhance my creativity Because a lot of us don't think we're very creative and we're all very creative. You're very creative in your profession to say the least. Try. We try. Let's have you back for that too, by the way. Let's schedule it. I like the concept of climbing bowls.

It feels like what I do every day trying to call it. A friend of mine said that and it just caught my attention. I said, how can you climb bubbles? Well, that's what creativity is all about. I gave her credit in the book, obviously. But that's another thing. Listen to other people. Learn from other people. Procrastinators are not very good at learning from other people. So ask people for help.

Most people will help you out. There you go. If you go to paint the house, you never painted your house before. Talk to the guy next door who's painting this house. How'd it go? What do I do? Do I need to get a lamp? I mean, all those kinds of things. It'll leverage your time and get rid of the frictions

that can get you in the way there you go uh it's pretty freaking awesome man i love this concept uh when you uh do you do coaching to help people overcome their uh overcome their issues yeah i do a select a few of people who are really kind of motivated uh to change because a of times it's a career. A lot of times if you're a procrastinator, you're a VP and you want to be a president or whatever the titles are, a VP and you want to be a principal. A lot of times procrastination will keep you from doing that. And that's where I'd like to be able to help people and not criticize them. A lot of times the self-criticism that procrastinators beat themselves up with doesn't work, and we know that from a research point of view. Being kinder

to yourself kind of works. I don't want to sound like a touchy-feely kind of person, but beating yourself up doesn't help. Being kind to yourself, saying, hey, I got five things done today, that's a victory. Being kinder is good. There's one thing that enabled me. Is that okay if I just share this?

I still procrastinate a little bit. I hate my income tax returns like everyone does, I'm sure. But I find it very, very difficult. And so I came across this concept called temptation bundling. And it's very evocative. Temptation bundling is when you take a noxious task like your income tax and you marry it or connect connected to something that you like to do. So if you don't want to do some exercise, you might exercise with a friend or you don't want to clean out the garage, but you might listen to the sports station. You don't want to iron all the clothes until you

watch a movie while you're doing it. You bundle the temptation with what you don't want to do and it'll move you forward. And how I do it is I like sports a lot, especially football. And I'll get all my notes, and I'll do my income tax. I'm going to organize it over about a week period of time. It takes me a lot longer, but I enjoy the experience. I said, oh, look at that pass. Eagles are looking pretty good this year. I love it. And I get done.

And the key for crash racers is not worry about the time frame is completing. And if you complete it, you've got a big victory. We put these deadlines in our heads. You chase deadlines all your life. And we're not very good at identifying realistic deadlines. There you go. How do I know if I'm a procrastinator? How many people are chronic procrastinators? About 25% of the adult population in this country. And it's cross-cultural. You could drop us in China, Nigeria, Brazil, and they're doing the same thing that we're doing. We're procrastinating. So it's not a cultural thing or people in a certain country doing this.

Yeah, exactly. Yeah, you go there and visit them and see what they're doing. Across the world, people procrastinate about the same amount of population. There you go. And is this the same reason people fail with most of their New Year's resolutions? Great point. The research is 92% of us fail by the end of January. And there's two reasons for this that are really important for people.

We're way too aspirational. Like I said a couple years ago, my doctor, I said, I want to lose 20 pounds in January. And he knows me really well. He said, you're ridiculous. It took you a year to gain 20 said, oh, I want to lose 20 pounds in January. And he knows me really well. He said, are you ridiculous? It took you a year to gain 20 pounds. You're not going to lose 20 pounds. He said, let's go for one pound a week.

And I said, oh, one pound a week ain't much. He said, in three months, you'll see a big difference. And he was exactly right. So we have way too many goals, right? And then somehow, magically, by the end of January, we're going to accomplish all these things. And so the research shows us, have more time, give yourself more time. Like he said, over three months, a pound a week, and I actually lost 15 pounds. So I was very pleased with that.

Oh, there you go. Be realistic, right? Cut down your goals and give yourself more time and that'll help. That'll help anyone out. I mean, it'll help anyone out because like I said, 92% of us don't get their resolutions and we beat ourselves up for it yeah it's true we we were very bad that way um well what is uh something you call it the planning fallacy what is that oh that's great that's by a guy named daniel kahneman who's a very famous

nobel prize winner in economics brilliant brilliant guy and he wrote a lot of stuff but this is the one thing i took away from him and it's the same things that we've been talking about. Kahneman won a Nobel Prize for this kind of theory. The theory is it will always take longer, always. He was part of a project he thought would be done in the summer, and it took seven years. He's a research scientist. He said, we've got to figure this out. He says, always take longer, and it will always be harder.

So if you have those two things when you take on a project, you've got to realize up front, so if it's going to be harder, you better have rewards set up for yourself. You better have chewable chunks set up for yourself. You better have temptation bundling set up for yourself because it is going to be harder. Something meaningful. I'm not talking about taking out the garbage, but something meaningful like going for an MBA or cleaning out the garage or raising a good family.

I mean, all those things take time and a lot of effort and a lot of patience on the part of the parents. They do. I like that you mentioned chewing the chunks. One of my things that I always have when I'm doing a giant task is to think of, okay, this is huge. And I feel, like you mentioned before, the overwhelmingness of it. And I go, and I go, okay, you're, you've got an elephant in front of you. Okay. Let's start chewing the, eating the elephant one bite at a time.

So just let's, let's grab a bite, start chewing. And I've, I've kind of habitualized myself to a while that i know that okay if we start down the road we start chewing that thing one day that elephant's going to be gone what's the next step what's not the whole elephant right you've missed out one chunk at a time one chunk at a time and over time that elephant will disappear it'll take a long time but it'll be done it'll that's a great that's a great strategy. It is. The problem is just trying to get, you know, to that first bunch of bites where you're just like, you finally sit down with yourself and you go,

you know, you do that Faustian bargain or whatever. Yep. Is it Faustian bargain? Where you're like, yeah, where you're like, okay, well, let's get her done. Let's get her done. Yeah, starting is the hardest part. I mentioned that. And just starting is important.

What we know, if you start a task, about 50% of the time you'll continue. Yeah. So that's pretty good odds. 50%? That's a pretty good shot. If it doesn't happen, then you come back the next day, you take another little bite. Take another bite and just keep pushing towards that effort. And these are real important aspects. People these in all in all sorts of different things

to get stuff done but i i i fell in love probably it appeals to me the yellow pad thing um yeah i've always loved legal yellow pads i used to do this thing i talked about in my book that the way i used to innovate was i would go on trips and I would take a legal yellow pad with me because I come from the old world and uh and looking at the blank slate of the yellow pad would make me always want to fill it in and so I would put down ideas and I just start writing down whatever I put down here's an idea here's a and once I started writing down ideas it would fill and it was also a great way for me to kind of have that blank slate to look at something I wanted to innovate from a different angle. Like start over, basically.

It's like there's nothing on the page. Let's just start over with this idea or process of my business. And let's just start over. Like what goes here? What goes in one place? And sometimes I would you know look at a something i innovated over and over again years before and i'd just be like why do i do it this way and i'd write it down and review it and then i'd be like oh this is why i did this way

because the other ways suck so this actually is the best way right now and um and so i would do that and then uh but i love the concept of yellow pad. I would always keep yellow pads with me whenever I wanted to be an idea, man. But now I need to keep one around. It sounds like for tasks. Try it and see if it works for you. But I love the idea of you got to blank. It's a blank slate, right?

You're fresh, new. And what are the possibilities? And then your brain's smart. It'll fill things in there. But yeah. Yeah. And that whole thing of being able to cross it out and then you know rip one off for the day and i learned that post-it thing from a guy who's in government he was the secretary to

reported to the governor in pennsylvania and he had this whiteboard with all these post-its and i said michael what is that and he explained the process to me. And the minute I heard it, I said, I'm going to use this. And I've used it for about 15 years. Setting up the risk-reward. I would imagine identifying, though, you're having an emotional response to something you should do logically. It might be one of the ways to deal with that.

You're like, I'm being a bit of an emotional little baby about this grow up i don't know does that help at all well what did they call in surfing your emotions ah surfing emotions yeah because sometimes let's say you're in a in a social setting and you get upset because someone said something stupid or off record you're not gonna start yelling and screaming at somebody, even though that's what you feel like, right? No, you just throw something at them across the table. But there's times we can control our emotions because it's appropriate, and so our emotions don't have to drive us.

And that's one of the things with procrastinators. They feel these emotions, and if they can do surfing by just watching it, and one of the biggest things they can do is learn to meditate for about five or ten minutes, not for 30 minutes or an hour, but for five or ten minutes, and you begin to see that your thoughts are always passing by and you're not reacting to them. You don't have to react to the stress or anxiety. Now, that takes some skill and some practice, but that's one of the biggest levers around procrastination.

There you go. And that'll, I mean, that's one of the biggest levers around procrastination. There you go. And that'll, I mean, that's, that's one of the biggest challenges you have. Uh, any final thoughts as we go out and pitch on the book, you want to throw at people? Yeah. Two things.

It's sometimes it's really helpful for you to have an accountability partner. And that's something you have a lot of respect for, you know, not just the buddy you beers with, but someone who, if you gave them your word, you know, it'd be a strong commitment and you wouldn't want to come. I wouldn't want to come to Chris and say, you know, Chris, I said I was going to do this, but I didn't do it.

Because I'd be very concerned you'd be, you know, feel less about me. So a common family partner is really a powerful little lever. And the last thing I'll share, Chris, if we have time, is Mark Twain said years ago, and I think it's a big misdirection, you've got two frogs, eat the big one first. And for procrastinators, they'll never eat the big one first. Won't happen. But the little one, right?

It's horrible. Cutting little slices, making the social activity with some friends, heavy reward maps, all those kinds of little activities. And all of a sudden, I get done this small frog or small task. I feel successful. I'm motivated. And all of a sudden I get done this small frog or small task. I feel successful.

I'm motivated. And now I have some strategies to tackle the bigger task. So sometimes go for the small one, get her done with some of these little tools and techniques, and then you can tackle the big task. There you go. I love it. So give people the final pitch. Tell people where to buy the book and your.com.

Yeah. It's a, the book is on Amazon. Um, uh, how to buy the book and your.com. Yeah. The book is on Amazon, How to Be a Better Procrastinator. And the name of my company is my last name, The Sanahan, S-A-N-A-G-H-A-N Group.com. And there's a lot of good books and articles and papers and all that kind of stuff on there. Thank you very much, Chris, for your time. This is fun. This has been a lot of fun. And you've given me some tools to deal with my lazy self and the people with procrastination.

And don't procrastinate putting off buying the book, folks. And it's almost the holiday season, so the best thing to do is give this away as a gift to maybe some of the people. If you're that wife who's always trying to get the husband to do the honey-do's the time. He's busy playing video games or whatever it is. Have him get him the book so you can get more of those honey do's done. I can see a whole bunch. Absolutely. I had a colleague of mine that mailed a copy of the book to his partner.

Honestly, the partner opens it up and sees the book and says, what is this all about? It was kind of quiet, anonymous feedback. He read the book. Thanks a lot. Thank you very much. Holiday season is coming up, folks.

Order it for your family. Thanks for tuning in, everyone. We certainly appreciate it. Go to goodreads.com, 4chesschrisfast, linkedin.com, 4chesschrisfast, youtube.com, 4chesschrisfast, and chrisfast1 on the tickety-tockety. Thanks for tuning in. Be good to each other. Stay safe. We'll see you guys next time.