This article is going to be eclectic: I am taking methods and distinctions from Werner Erhard, from Robert Fritz, from Eckhart Tolle… and of humble myself… hey, after 22 years of transformational coaching I do have my own methods and distinctions!

So let’s start right away.

I am going to recount a conversation from yesterday: this way you’ll have an example or two, plus what I did to loosen the grip of procrastination.

During a group project, one of the participants became restless and spiteful. He loved what we were doing, building a strong foundation for their business, yet, he kept interrupting the process by urging us to do something that will make him a quick 6 grands.

Instead of continuing as if nothing happened, I chose to address the issue.

In this group we are building a foundation for a new business that — if it is well constructed — will make money, almost on auto-pilot for years and years and years, for each participant.

Yet, both participants regularly come to the call, unprepared, waiting for the group to do for them what they need… even though every person is building their own business. Or should. But instead, they are not doing anything, or better said, they are doing everything else.

Which is why I titled this article “procrastination”.

Procrastination is when you are doing lots of things, instead of what you know you would most benefit from.

You know you are procrastinating, because in the bottom of your being there is a restlessness, there is a sense that you are doing something that cheats you out of what’s your due, and that you are damaging yourself and your life.

The conversation, that you are aware of, says something like this: “I should be doing something else.”

The person, let’s call him G., says that it is like demons arise and take possession of him.

I know about demons. Demons are like many other creatures, ego, pain body, jealousy, etc. only survive in the periphery of our vision, in the shadows. They are threatening, they take possession of you, because you are afraid to look them square in the eye and see them for what they are: constructs of your ego.

So let’s see how we can stare procrastination demon down and make him to leave you alone.

First: we must know that procrastination wears an invisible cloak… and only if you manage to undress it naked, get to its core, that you can actually win against it.

We can only get to the core of it, if we manage to undress it from the layers of cloaks that intend to hide its real nature.

You’ll see, it is quite simple, once you know how.

The top “cloak” is: there must be something wrong with me that I am not doing what I am supposed to do.
Next layer: Not doing what I am supposed to do is wrong.
Next layer: If I am not doing that which I am supposed to do, something will happen and it is bad. Baaaaad.
Next layer: It’s bad because if I don’t do what I am supposed to do, the consequences are going to be bad. I would prefer a miracle…
Last layer: Having that is really bad. How it is is really bad. It needs to be fixed.

Let’s stop here: this is the layer where it is becoming obvious that this is an ego construct. Only the ego would consider that ‘how it is’ is wrong. Only the ego. The self is never concerned, the self is never comparing, and bad only exists in comparison with good… and therefore comparison is an ego move.

The next step is to examine what is so, what is the ego complaining about saying it shouldn’t be.

In our case, G is $300 in the red… meaning that he probably overdrew his account with this month’s rent check.

And that is really bad… whines the ego. And that really needs to be fixed… maybe with 6 grands… today? tomorrow? fast!

Now let’s see what we can do with this. You need to admit, that most people would go to the same place as G went with this fact. Except: the mindset that this decision: “6 grands is the goal,” comes from has a negative vibration, it takes him out of his present, where he would have power to act coherently and intelligently, and succeed. This decision puts him in a place where “flailing”, haste, ineffective action, scrambling, etc. happens.

The attention is kept on what shouldn’t be… and because only a fragment of the available attention is on what one could do… the actions are ineffective, and even more damaging than no action.

So what is to do?

I say, bring yourself to the present moment. Look through facts and not interpretations. How I normally explain how to do that is through an analogy: what would you see if you were an alien, like a visiting Martian, who is unfamiliar with our culture. What would you see, what would you say then.

Here is what a visiting Martian would say: there is a minus sign at the end of your balance sheet. I hear that the best when that sign is a plus. When you have a positive balance. The difference is $300.

That was helpful, right?

Next step: Let’s examine the “goal” of quickly making 6,000 dollars. What’s wrong with that, you say? Lots, lots. You’ll see.

The number came from thin air. There is no rhyme or rhythm to it. The ego will use it to take you out… *

What should you say instead? I suggest that you sit down and examine what is your necessary outflow a month, rent, internet, phone, etc.

You look if there is any expense that you can easily eliminate. Like in the past week I canceled three monthly subscriptions that I can live without. Total $168 savings. Monthly.

When you are done, you have a number. That is the minimum you must make a month to pay your obligations. Budget some money for food and transportation… add it up, and that is your minimum goal for the next month. **

Most likely, just like G, you are not making that sum reliably… so that is your goal for the next month. If you are making more than that… this example is not for you.

When, instead, you throw out a number that is way out of what you can believe, you will sabotage yourself and do nothing.

Create a plan, and make the plan a solid one, that you can count on that money being generated month after month. Don’t create a temporary project, it will fail you on the level of life. Once you can fulfill that minimum goal, you can either work on increasing your earnings, by 10-20 percent at a time, or start working, in your spare time, on a new project that can make a steady second income.

You’ll see, that when you interact with reality with reality based goals, procrastination will leave… it can’t stand you being clear, being in the present, being powerful.

In the next article we’ll talk about how to start a business and what you need to have a chance to be successful at it.

*(I’ll write about this in a subsequent article…)
**(Unless you want to follow the principles in The Richest Man in Babylon, then add 10 percent on top of it, so that you can start your wealth fund account at the same time, and another 10 percent if you have debts to pay off.)

*** Visit my blogs on squdoo   eckhart-tolles-distinctions-in-a-new-earth and distinctions