A journey of a thousand miles begins with one step.
Lao-Tzu
The biggest thief of success is procrastination. We can think about doing the right thing, plan to do it, and talk about doing it, but nothing changes in our lives until we start consistently doing what we need to do. Perhaps you have so many bad habits that you feel overwhelmed, and you are not even sure that you want to read the rest of this book. You would like to have change, but you’re not sure you want to change. Someone said, “Bad habits are like a comfortable bed, easy to get into, but hard to get out of.” Bruce Barton said, “What a curious phenomenon it is that you can get men to die for the liberty of the world who will not make the little sacrifice that is needed to free themselves from their own individual bondage.”
Are you willing to sacrifice and do the more difficult thing now in order to enjoy a life of freedom later on? The irony is that we are often unwilling to suffer for a short while just to do what needs to be done; then we end up with continual misery, dread, guilt, and the penalties of having put off something that would have taken a few minutes or a few hours to do. In other words, by putting off the “pain” of doing something hard, we often spend much more time avoiding it than it would take to just do it.
To me nothing feels better than knowing that I am doing my best, making the best choices I can make, and consistently making progress toward the best life that God has for me. Being mediocre does not feel good to me, and I doubt that it feels good to you either. You may have gotten used to it and forgotten that there is something better, but this is a wake-up call to arise and be all you can be. The best time to get started is now!
We can become very addicted to our little habits and find it difficult to give them up even if they are harming us. We all have good and bad habits, but Benjamin Franklin said, “Your net worth to the world is usually determined by what remains after your bad habits are subtracted from your good ones.” Get started right now forming all the good habits you can. Soon they will outnumber the bad ones, and your value to yourself, your family, your friends and society will increase exponentially.
The way to get started is to quit talking and begin doing.
Walt Disney
Procrastination is very deceptive. It makes us complacent by telling us that we are going to do the right thing. It justifies inactivity. I once heard a story about three demons who were graduating from their course on how to deceive people in the world and prevent them from knowing God. Satan was questioning each demon, and he asked each one how he would deceive people. The first one answered that he would tell people there was no God. Satan answered, “You won’t deceive many because most people down deep inside of them do believe God exists even if they have not chosen to follow Him.” The second demon said he would tell people that heaven and hell didn’t really exist. Satan said, “You will deceive a few more than your coworker, but you won’t get many souls either.” The third demon said that he would tell people that there was no hurry, and they could put off the decision to follow God until another time. Satan got excited and said loudly, “You will reap many souls for the kingdom of darkness by simply telling them to make the decision later.” I have never forgotten this story even though I heard it approximately twenty years ago.
Procrastination is a thief. It steals our time, our potential, our self-esteem, our peace of mind. It is like a lullaby that whispers, “Go to sleep; everything will be fine.” But everything will not be fine if we put off doing what we need to do. And the task isn’t going to get done by itself! It’s not going anywhere. Procrastination is very deceptive, and we can only conquer it by becoming what I call a “now” person. Be aggressive when you know you need to do something. Don’t put it off and keep putting it off… just do it!
I am sitting in my bedroom this morning working on this book. A few minutes ago I looked at my bed, which was still unmade. I got up to get something, and as I passed by the bed I thought about making it and then thought, “Oh, I will do it later.” I could have done that, but I know myself well enough to know that I would have found looking at the messed-up bed unpleasant throughout the day. I recognize the importance of doing what I need to do right away, so I defeated procrastination by simply taking a few minutes to make the bed. Now I feel better about myself and about the way the room looks and I can get back to work.
When we put things off, they aggravate us. We may not even be consciously aware of it, but unfinished projects pressure us. If you walk through your home and see dishes in the sink, laundry on the floor, trash cans filled to the brim, beds unmade, every countertop piled high with mail that needs to be sorted, I feel certain that it pressures you in some way. You may even get grouchy and start an argument with someone else in the house just because you feel overwhelmed. When we find fault with someone else it diverts our attention from how we feel about ourselves. Procrastination never makes us feel good.
If the grass needs to be cut, the weeds need to be pulled, the car needs to be washed and the oil needs to be changed, and the garage is a disorganized mess, it pressures you. You can complain about the mess or you can stop procrastinating and take action—one item at a time—to bring order to your home. God is certainly a God of order and organization. Some of the details recorded in the Bible about the building of the Ark and the Temple are just amazing to me. God made sure that everything was done in the most orderly and best way possible. Chaos makes us feel confused, and God is not the author of confusion but of order and peace (1 Corinthians 14:33).
I want to share with you the story of a woman who had only one bad habit. Ellen was a warm, generous woman who was extremely intelligent and talented. Her husband, children, and grandchildren adored her. Her colleagues at the elementary school where she taught marveled at her rapport with the young children in her classes and her ability to impart to them the love of learning. She was close to her parents and treasured her many friendships. Ellen was so busy keeping up with all these things that she found herself at home very little, and when she was at home, she was exhausted.
One day after work she collected the mail and just put it in a pile on her desk. She didn’t feel like dealing with it right then; it could wait until the next day. She needed to complete her students’ grades for the year, which would require a few hours. But she had two weeks before those were due, so she decided to enjoy some well-earned downtime and watch a movie instead. Ellen’s grandchildren were going to arrive for a weeklong visit during spring break, which would start in a few days. The house was a mess, but she still had the weekend to clean and prepare for the visit. Ellen had promised her husband that she would renew the registrations on their cars, which were due in a few days. The final reminder was in the pile of mail she’d left on the desk.
The next night Ellen came home as tired as she’d been the evening before. So she threw the day’s mail on the desk and headed into the kitchen to prepare dinner. After the meal, the evening vanished as she returned phone calls from friends and watched a little TV. One day turned into another… and all the while small things piled up waiting for Ellen’s attention.
There wasn’t any one big reason for the fact that Ellen’s life became harder and more unhapppy. It was just the culmination of a lot of little tasks and responsibilities that Ellen had put off. Tasks like paying the bills on time, tidying up the house, handing in her students’ grades accurately and on time—none of them major.
Maybe you can guess how this story is going to end. Bills piled up unpaid. There was enough money in the couple’s bank account to pay them—Ellen just disliked the chore of bill paying. Eventually penalties accrued and ultimately most of the cards were revoked for delinquency. Ellen was a great teacher, but her paperwork was always late. When her school had to trim the faculty, Ellen was the person who was laid off. Remember that car registration that Ellen was supposed to renew? She forgot. As a result, she and her husband couldn’t take their grandchildren on the getaway they’d planned… the suspended registrations kept the cars in the driveway that week.
Ellen only had one bad habit. But that single habit of procrastination created so many small problems that they eventually added up to big problems.
You can form the habit of being a “now” person, one who does what needs to be done as soon as you can. All truly successful people have this habit. We don’t become successful by putting things off. Here are a few quotes on procrastination that I think are particularly helpful:
• “Procrastination is like a credit card, it is a lot of fun until you get the bill.” Christopher Parker
• “There are so many things that we wish we had done yesterday, and so few that we feel like doing today.” Mignon McLaughlin
• “If you have goals and procrastination, you have nothing. If you have goals and you take action, you will have anything you want.” Thomas J. Vilord
• “Procrastination is the kidnapper of souls, and the recruiting-officer of Hell.” Edward Irving
• “Procrastination is the seed of self-destruction.” Matthew Burton
• “When there is a hill to climb don’t think that waiting will make it smaller.” Author Unknown
• “Procrastination is suicide on the installment plan.” Author Unknown
As believers in Jesus Christ, we learn that we receive everything we need from God through faith. Faith is now! It is trusting now that God will take care of yesterday and tomorrow. We are justified and made right with God through faith alone, yet the apostle James tells us that faith without works is dead.
So also faith, if it does not have works (deeds and actions of obedience to back it up), by itself is destitute of power (inoperative, dead).
James 2:17
There are probably thousands upon thousands of people who consider themselves to be great people of faith, and yet they procrastinate all the time. Procrastination is not faith, because true faith demands action. It is true that faith sometimes waits for God to work, but most of the time it must take action to be obedient when God speaks.
We need not wait for some special word from God telling us what to do. In the Bible, God has already given us most of the direction we will need in our lives. When I noticed my unmade bed, I did not need a special word from God to know that the best thing to do would be to make it up. The only thing left to do was obey.
I realize that some of you may have serious bad habits, and you may be thinking that my example of an unmade bed is rather unimportant. However, I am of the opinion that if we are willing to obey and take action in the smallest detail, we will have fewer problems with the bigger projects in life.
Let me offer some help by using examples from my life where procrastinating caused huge problems. For example, I had back pain for many years, but it was not so serious that I couldn’t work through it each day. Friends and family told me often that I needed to see a doctor or a chiropractor, but I procrastinated year after year. Finally one morning I was unable to walk when I got out of bed and had no choice but to make an emergency appointment with a chiropractor. My back was inflamed, and I had some disk degeneration. Pain is a signal that something is wrong and needs attention, and when we ignore it, we only complicate the problem. If I had taken care of my back and gotten some professional advice when the pain first surfaced, I could possibly have saved myself a great deal of pain and hundreds of hours of time spent on doctor visits over the years. Remember, procrastination is fun until reality sets in.
I remember a dentist telling me once, “We need you to start coming in for your regular cleaning and checkups so you can stop needing emergency appointments because you have a toothache.” He reminded me that the only time he saw me was when I had had an emergency, which wasn’t fair to him because my emergency put pressure on his already full schedule. Not only that, but my procrastinating exacted a high price from me. After all, it’s less painful—and less expensive—to have a cavity filled than to have oral surgery.
My excuse for procrastinating was that I was busy. Does that sound familiar? When we refuse to use our time to do the things we need to do, we always end up losing time taking care of the emergencies and messes we created through procrastinating.
I hope you have chosen one good habit that you want to make and one bad habit that you want to break. NOW is the time to get started! While I am writing this book we are in the Christmas and New Year season, and I have heard several people declare what they are going to do as soon as the holidays are over. They are going to lose weight, begin an exercise program, organize their lives, and other similar things. A few of them may follow through, but honestly I already know that most of them won’t. They are procrastinators, and people who procrastinate today will find a reason to do so tomorrow also.
I started my current workout regimen on December 23, 2006, and God has given me the grace to continue doing it. My trainer said I had to begin the program with twenty-one days of no sugar, and he gave me a specific diet I was to follow that was designed to shock my body and reset my metabolism. I recall people asking me why in the world I started such a program the day before Christmas Eve. I did it because I thought if I could do it during the most luscious eating times of the year, then surely I could do it the rest of the time. It is not wise to wait until a time that you feel will be convenient to begin any task. Great character is not developed through ease and convenience but through doing NOW what needs to be done no matter how difficult it is.
All those who have received Jesus as their Savior and Lord have His Spirit in them, and His Spirit is one of a Conqueror. Jesus is a mighty warrior, and He has not called us to be fainting saints. Don’t dread anything, but instead conquer it. The longer we put something off and think about it, the more we turn what is actually a molehill into a mountain. When we are people of action, we don’t give the devil time to exaggerate the reality of what we are facing. Don’t dread making and breaking habits, but be excited about the challenge in front of you. I honestly don’t want to live without goals, and when I accomplish one, I look forward to the next one. I don’t always like the work involved, but I love, love, love the results and the feeling of conquering and accomplishment. I believe you will too. I have heard people say, “I am just a procrastinator,” as if that were their identity. We are children of God, joint heirs with Christ, filled with the Holy Spirit, anointed by God, gifted, talented, and able to do whatever we need to do in life through Christ (Philippians 4:13).
If you have the small opinion of yourself that you are merely a procrastinator, you are pitiful indeed. I encourage you to get a new attitude, one of a warrior and a conqueror. Look forward to climbing mountains. Caleb asked for a mountain when he was eighty years old! (See Numbers 13.) Why not? He knew that as long as God was with him, he could do great things.
Congratulations! You are still reading, and that means you are on your way to making good habits and breaking bad ones. Choose something and begin today. Stick with it until you have victory, and then choose another and repeat the process. Don’t stop until you have developed the habits you want to have.