little guides to remove procrastination

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www.hillaryrettig.com/page 1

TITLE

The Little Guide To Beating Procrastination,

Perfectionism and Blocks: A Manual for Artists,

Activists, Entrepreneurs, Academics and Other

Ambitious Dreamers

by Hillary Rettig, http://www.hillaryrettig.co m

[email protected]

VERSION INFORMATION

Version 1.0 released 12/10/07

AUTHORSHIP

This e-book is adapted from my book The Lifelong Activist: How to Change the World

Without Losing Your Way (Lantern Books, 2006). For more information on The Lifelong

Activist please visit http://www.hillaryrettig.com.

I do life and career coaching that help activists, artists, entrepreneurs, students and other

ambitious dreamers break free of procrastination, perfectionism, fear, negativity and

other blocks to success so that they can achieve their life goals. I also help people

succeed at their job searches (thats what the subject of my next book will be). If you like

the approach in this e-book, and think my coaching would be helpful to you, please email

me at [email protected]. You can also read more about my coaching and

workshop services at http://www.hillaryrettig.com.

If this e-book has helped you, and/or if you have suggestions for the next edition, I would

welcome hearing from you. Thanks, Hillary. [email protected]

WARRANTY

The information in this e-book is presented without warranty of any kind. It has helpedwww.hillaryre

ttig.com/page 2

many people, and it is my sincere wish that it help you, but I cant accept responsibility

for any negative result you feel you may have obtained from using it. If you are suffering


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from an intractable procrastination problem, or panic attacks, anxiety, depression,

addiction or any other psychological or physical condition, please seek professional help

before following the advice herein. - Hillary

LICENSE

This e-book is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share

Alike 3.0 license, which means you are allowed to copy, alter and distribute it non-

commercially so long as you include the above Title, Version, Authorship and Warranty

statements, as well as this License statement. If you choose to distribute your altered

version to others, you must permit them the same freedom to copy, alter and distribute

non-commercially under the same terms. For more details click on this link:

http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/3.0/us/.

TEXT NOTES

*Throughout The Little Guide, I use the term artist to refer to creative people of all

types, including fine artists, musicians, writers, and performers, as well as craftspeople,

designers, and other commercial or applied artists.

*I often use the word student to refer both to students I have taught in classes and

workshops, and individuals I have coached.

*Please note that although the techniques described in The Little Guide work on their

own, youll probably achieve better results using them in conjunction with the Mission

Management and Time Management techniques described in Parts I and II of The

Lifelong Activist. I didnt include those topics here because I wanted to write a little guide

that focused just on the topic that most people seem most urgently interested in,

overcoming procrastination. I do, however, occasionally refer to the importance of

managing your mission and time in this e-book, and urge you to pick up The Lifelong

Activist to read up on those topics.www.hillaryrettig.com/page 3

TABLE OF CONTENTS

PART I. THE PROBLEM DEFINED


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1. An Early Morning in May (or September, or January)

2. Things That Bump Us Off Our Path

3. Despairand Hope

4. The Problem You Think Youre Solving

5. The Problems You Should Be Solving

6. Fear 1. Introduction to Fear and Fear of Change

7. Fear II. Fear of Failure

8. Fear III. Fear of Success

9. No Such Thing as Pure Failure or Success

10. Dont Compound Fear With Shame

11. Fear Creates Obstacles to Success

12. The Most Important Thing You Need to Know About Your Obstacles

13. Non Obstacles

14. Beware Myths that Promote and Excuse Failure

15. Perfectionism

16. Negativity

17. Negativity II

18. Hypersensitivity

19. Panic: The Fear-Amplifier

PART II. THE SOLUTIONS

20. False Solution I: Mean Mommy/Mean Daddy

21. False Solutions II and III: Selling Out and Stalling Out

22. False Solution IV: Dithering

23. Solution I: The Three Productivity Behaviors

24. Practicing the Three Productivity Behaviors

25. Five Success Tips

26. Solution II: A Process for Overcoming Fear-Based Procrastination and Panic


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27. Tools for Change I: Journaling

28. Tools for Change II: Therapy and Self-Care

29. Tools for Change II: A Created Communitywww.hillaryrettig.com/page 4

30. Finding and Cultivating Mentors

31. The Ultimate Solution (Solution III) to Managing Your Fears

32. Developing an Empowered Personality

33. What Empowered People Dowww.hillaryrettig.com/page 5

PART I. THE PROBLEM DEFINED

Chapter 1.

An Early Morning in May (or September, or January)

So heres what happens:

You have a plan lets say, to wake up at 7; be washed and dressed and

breakfasted by 8; at your desk, easel or other workspace by 9; work three hours; exercise

during your lunch break; eat a healthy salad at your desk; work four more hours; come

home; eat dinner with your partner; work a couple more hours in the evening; and then

curl up in bed with a good book.

But you dont follow the plan.

Maybe you wake up late - at 8, or 9, ornoon! The plan is trashed before you

even get started.

Or, maybe, it takes you not one, but three hours to make it to your desk. And then,

once youre there, you spend an hour or three reading the newspaper, Web surfing, and

making personal calls.

Or, maybe when lunchtime rolls around you dont exercise and instead of a salad

eat a gigantic submarine sandwich - and then spend the rest of the afternoon feeling

sluggish and dont get much done.

Etc.

Procrastination is when you get bumped off the path you set for yourself for the


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day. Meaning, you start the day with a plan, but somehow, by the time bedtime rolls

around, you havent accomplished some, or all, of what you had intended.

There are other definitions of procrastination, but I like mine because it reflects

the notion that, at every moment, youre making a choice to either stay on your path (or

schedule) or leave it. The challenge of beating procrastination is the challenge of

resisting the urge to leave your path. This is also the challenge of beating blocks, since a

block is really an ongoing procrastination problem that lasts weeks, months, years or

decades.

This e-book will help you figure out what is causing you to leave your daily path,

and what you can do to stay on it. It offers not one, but three proven solutions to

procrastination: Ive used these solutions myself with great success, and so have many of

my students and coaching clients. Moreover, these solutions work fast. Students whowww.hillaryret

tig.com/page 6

employ them often shoot ahead like arrows on their goals, even if theyve been blocked

for years. Ill explain why that is so later in the book. For now, just relax and read on,

and rest assured that, by the time you finish, you will be much more empowered to finally

defeat your procrastination problem and live the productive and happy life youve always

yearned for.

Chapter 2.

Things That Bump Us Off Our Path

Lets say you planned to be at your computer, working on a project, at 10 a.m. on

a Monday morning, but youre not. Why not? The answer could be one or more of the

following:

*Got up late.

*Quarreled with your lover last night, and keep reliving the quarrel in your mind.

*Are too tired the coffee hasnt kicked in yet.

*Are too hyper drank too much coffee and cant sit still.

*Are distracted by the weather its beautiful out and youd love to take a walk


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number of preventable emergencies in your life, and to learn to delegate as much as

possible.

If it sounds like Im taking a hard line, I am. I need to, because procrastinators are

often adept at rationalizing their diversions. Obviously, if someone is sick or otherwise

incapacitated, we should help them, but to what extent? Its not always clear, and many

procrastinators misjudge, sacrificing too much of their own time to help others, even

when those others arent particularly needy or when someone else is available to help.

This problem can be hard to identify, much less solve, because the (deservedly) virtuous

feeling one gets from helping often offsets the guilt that the procrastination normally

engenders.

Look at Your Commitments With a Fresh Eye

When you start looking at your commitments from the standpoint of someone

who is determined to succeed at their ambitious dream meaning, someone who must

use their time optimally - fresh solutions to formerly unsolvable dilemmas often

present themselves. So, for instance:

*Your elderly parents could probably find someone else to mow their lawn and

pick up the groceries - like another family member, or the high school kid down the block

who needs a few extra bucks. Or,

*Your spouse and kids could probably survive on take-out (or cook their own

food!) a few nights a week. Or,

*Your friend who needs a lot of support could find others - friends or even

professionals, such as a therapist - to help provide it.

If you didnt have an ambitious dream that you were pursuing on top of lifes

ordinary demands, then maybe you could get away with mowing the lawn, cooking allwww.hillaryret

tig.com/page 8

the meals, and talking for hours each day with your friend. But once you own up to your

ambitious dream, you are essentially declaring that you will be very particular and self-

directed in how you spend your time, because you need to reserve as much time as


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possible for your dream. This is in direct contrast to most people, who let others -

including loved ones, friends, neighbors, coworkers and corporations - control their time

for them.

Almost all ambitious dreamers, for instance, need to reduce the time they spend

on tedious household chores to as close as possible to zero, so that they can use the

reclaimed time and energy to work on their dream. Okay, if you enjoy gardening and it

feeds your soul, then dont give that up. But laundry? Yard work? Mopping floors?

Standing in line at the grocery store? To the extent youre able to, find someone else to

do it. Send your laundry out to be done, hire someone to maintain the lawn (or get your

spouse or kids to do it), buy a floor-mopping robot, and have your groceries delivered. If

you feel funny doing any of that, get over it: reducing your housework burden is an

investment in yourself. Besides, its unrealistic to think that you can spend your time the

same way non-ambitious dreamers do and still accomplish your ambitious dream.

None of this should be taken to mean that you abandon your family or friends. It

just means you invest your time judiciously. Even though youre not mowing your

parents lawn, for instance, you could still be taking them to medical appointments: thats

a much higher value activity that is probably a far better use of your time. And even

though youre not cooking home-cooked dinners every night, you could still do it a

couple of times a week. And even though youre not going to be able to talk to your

friend for hours every day, you could still be available to her in times of real need.

It can be scary to change the terms of our interaction with someone, especially if

weve been interacting with them a certain way for years. (Double-especially if weve

been taught to subordinate our needs to others, as many women in particular are.) People

often react badly when we tell them we cant do as much for them, or spend as much time

with them, as we have been. Often, however, if we take the time to share our situation,

dreams and needs, they are surprisingly understanding and eager to help. So dont just tell

people you will be less available - tell them why, and ask for their support and help.


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confusing. At bedtime, you look back on the day and cant figure out where your time

went. You remember reading the headlines, drinking a cup of coffee with your

officemates, watching some television, and surfing the Web, but those random activities

couldnt possibly have filled the entire day, could they? But, of course, they did. Thats

what Charles Dickens meant, in David Copperfield, when he had Mr. Macawber call

procrastination, the thief of time. To a procrastinator, it really does feel as if his or her

time were somehow stolen.

If a procrastination problem is serious enough, and lasts long enough, it is often

called a block, as in writers block. Anyone can be blocked, and many people,

perhaps most, are. Sometimes, blocks last for weeks or months, but often, tragically, they

last for years, decades or even entire lifetimes. Being blocked is one of the worst feelings

in the world; it drives some people to absolute despair.www.hillaryrettig.com/page 10

Wait - Theres Good News!

But wait - theres no need to feel ashamed or despairing! When one of my

students confesses to a procrastination problem, I congratulate her. Yes, congratulate.

Heres why:

*Procrastination is an affliction of ambitious people. If you dont believe me, do a

Web search on procrastination: youll get links to hundreds of pages advising you on how

not to procrastinate when writing your novel or thesis, pursuing a fitness program, or

looking for a new job. These are all ambitious endeavors, and people who pursue them

should be admired even if they do procrastinate.

*All procrastinators, no matter how thwarted, can boast at least one achievement:

they havent given up on their dream. If they had, they wouldnt be worried about

procrastinating on it.

To hold onto an ambitious dream despite ones fears, and also (frequently) despite

discouragement and disapproval from those around us and society itself, takes vision,

dedication and courage. So, instead of seeing your procrastination problem as a shameful


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flaw, try seeing it instead as a symbol of something great within you. Yeah, youve got

some work to do to realize your full potential - like who hasnt? But at least you keep

showing up and fighting the good fight.

Another reason not to feel bad about your procrastination problem is that pretty

much everyone procrastinates.

Ever since I became interested in procrastination, a few years back, Ive made a

point of asking many of the people I talk with whether they procrastinate. Ive asked very

successful people and people who were less successful; people with long-established

careers and those just starting out.

And guess what? Ive only met one or two people who said they never

procrastinated. So, pretty much everyone has days when they get bumped off their path.

Everyone has goals - often, the goals nearest and dearest to their hearts - that they are not

making progress on as fast as they would like. Its true that successful people tend to

procrastinate less than the unsuccessful ones - that is, I believe, the very thing that makes

them successful-but sometimes they do it, too.

This book is written specifically for artists, activists, entrepreneurs, academics

and other ambitious dreamers. Are these groups particularly prone to procrastination?

Maybe. As the late, great novelist and teacher John Gardner said in his book On

Becoming a Novelist:

Theoretically theres no reason one should get [writers block], if one understands thatwww.hillaryr

ettig.com/page 11

writing, after all, is only writing, neither something one ought to feel deeply guilty about

nor something one ought to be inordinately proud of. If children can build sand castles

without getting sand castle block, and ministers can pray over the sick without getting

holiness block, the writer who enjoys his work and takes measured pride in it should

never be troubled by writers block. But alas, nothings simple. The very qualities that

make one a writer in the first place contribute to block: hypersensitivity, stubbornness,

insatiability, and so on.


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Actually, thats not quite true. Any problem is hard to solve, if youre not really

solving it.

Huh?

I mean it: the only way to solve a problem is to solve it. If you try to solve a

problem using actions designed to solve some other problem, or actions designed to solve

no problem at all, but instead to maintain the status quo, then you are bound to fail.

(Why would someone who procrastinates, and is made miserable thereby, want to

maintain the status quo? See Chapter 5.) You can try from here to the moon, harnessing

all the brainpower, creativity and passion you can muster, and youll still never solve the

problem.

Makes sense, doesnt it? Heres how it applies to your procrastination problem:

You probably think the root problem causing your procrastination is laziness, lack

of discipline, lack of willpower, immaturity, lack of commitment, or some similar

character flaw.

But guess what? Its likely none of those.

First of all, most procrastinators are not - I repeat, not - lazy, undisciplined, etc. In

fact, most tend to be dynamos in areas other than the one they are procrastinating in. One

of the peculiar tortures of procrastination is that we are often productive in areas of our

lives other than the one closest to our heart.

Secondly - and you will hear me say this repeatedly because its such a vital point

- applying negative labels such as lazy or undisciplined to yourself is, from a

problem-solving standpoint, worse than useless. Not only do those labels misidentify the

problem, they actually make the situation worse by undermining your self-confidence and

predisposing you to failure. As I discuss in Chapter 20, parents, teachers, coaches and

mentors all know that criticism, shame and blame do not inspire positive behavioral

change. Rather, encouragement and praise for any small step taken are the way to go.

And thats not just true for kids; its true for everyone at any age.


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Moreover, the field of expectations psychology has shown us that people often

live up or down to the labels others stick on them; so that if someone repeatedly calls

you, or you repeatedly call yourself, lazy or uncommitted, you are likely to live down

to that label. Ill have a lot more to say about labels in Chapter 17, but in the meantime-

stop negatively labeling yourself!

******www.hillaryrettig.com/page 13

The Myth of Laziness

Think of yourself as lazy or uncommitted? In a book entitled The Myth of

Laziness, learning disabilities expert Mel Levine, M.D., discusses how many cases of

laziness can be traced to undiagnosed or untreated learning disabilities, teaching

failures, physical problems like bad eyesight or motor control, an inadequate physical

environment, or a chaotic family life. Once these causes are diagnosed and addressed, a

persons supposed laziness often evaporates. Levines approach highlights how just

important it is to characterize your procrastination problem properly.

******

Chapter 5.

The Problems You Should Be Solving

More often than not, solving, or resolving, a problem is a rather trivial exercise - once

we know what the problem is.-Gause and Weinberg, Are Your Lights On? How to

Figure Out What the Problem REALLY Is.

Treating procrastination as a symptom of laziness or a lack of discipline doesnt

work because those are not the causes of procrastination. Rather, they are symptoms, just

like procrastination itself is a symptom, of a deeper problem. That problem is usually

either:

1. You were never taught the habits of productive work. Since nature abhors a

vacuum, this probably means youve instead learned the default habits of low

productivity or non-productivity. This results in what I call Behavioral-Based


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Procrastination. Or,

2. Fear: of change, success, failure, etc. This results in what I call Fear-Based

Procrastination.

Often, people suffer from both.

Behavioral-Based Procrastination is a relatively simple problem to define and

solve, and I do so starting in Chapter 23.

Fear-Based Procrastination is more complex. Steven Pressfield, in his excellent

book The War of Art describes Resistance (his word for procrastination) as: invisible

internalinsidiousimplacableimpersonalinfallibleuniversal. Hes absolutelywww.hillaryrettig.

com/page 14

right. Unlike Behavioral-Based Procrastination, which is usually caused by a lack of

information or training, Fear-Based Procrastination is caused by, as its name implies,

fear. Fear is unfortunately a major force in many peoples lives: its often a rational, if

not optimal, response to the difficulties and stresses of life and an ambitious path.

The Purpose of Fear-Based Procrastination

Fear-Based Procrastination (FBP) is not a random bad habit: it has a purpose,

which is to keep you stuck at your current level of achievement so that you dont have to

face the frightening consequences of making progress on your goal.

*If youre a writer, artist, or student, FBP helps ensure that you either never start

your work, or never finish it. This, in turn, helps you avoid having your work judged and

possibly rejected. Or, judged and accepted, which may feel better than rejection initially,

but can bring its own problems and stresses, as I discuss in Chapter 8.

*If youre an activist, FBP helps ensure that you either dont do activism or dont

do it well. For instance, it could lead to your interacting mainly with people who already

share your views - the infamous echo chamber problem. This, in turn, helps you avoid

having your viewpoints, and possibly yourself, rejected. Or, it helps you avoid having

your viewpoint accepted, in which case you will have a new set of challenges and

responsibilities.


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*If youre an entrepreneur, FBP helps ensure that you either never start your

business, or that you spend your time doing the wrong work, or no work. This, in turn,

helps you avoid the scary task of sales, and consequent risk of rejection. Or, FBP helps

you avoid the stressful and scary consequences of business success, including a heavier

workload and more employees to manage.

*If you are in a bad relationship, FBP helps ensure that you never leave it. This, in

turn, helps you avoid the risks of loneliness, economic decline (if your partner is helping

to support your lifestyle), rejection by potential new lovers, or a future worse

relationship. Or, if the relationship is salvageable, FBP helps ensure that you do not go to

couples therapy or take other positive steps, thus helping you avoid the vulnerability and

risks inherent in true intimacy.

*If youre stuck in a bad job, FBP helps ensure that you either never look for

another one, or look ineffectually. This, in turn, helps you avoid having to do a full-bore

job search (a highly stressful experience for most people), possible rejection, or the

chance that youll wind up in an even worse job. Or, it helps you avoid the consequences

of success, including finding a job that might be better in many ways, but that also

involves more responsibility and stress.www.hillaryrettig.com/page 15

Fear-Based Procrastinations Stealthy Nature

Remember all those bumps we discussed in Chapter 2 - personal calls,

newspapers, Web surfing, brooding about relationships or the weather, etc.? As you now

know, those arent the actual cause of your procrastination - the cause is fear - but they

are the activities we turn to when we are afraid, and they serve to distract us from both

the fear, and the guilty knowledge that we are procrastinating. Procrastination has, in fact,

an amazing ability to disguise itself: that is one of its most powerful weapons. What

could be the harm in talking to Jane for ten more minutes, especially as shes having

such a rough day? we tell ourselves. Or: Wow, the living room rug is really filthy! It will

only take a few minutes to vacuum it... Or: Oh, theres my favorite actor on that TV show


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it cant hurt to watch for just a few minutes. Or: No point in even getting started before

Ive had my coffee. It all sounds so plausible - which is why procrastination, especially

after weve practiced it for years or decades, gains such a tough hold on us.

At its most insidious, procrastination disguises itself as a slew of productive-

seeming, but not actually productive, behaviors that suck up a lot of time and give you

the illusion of progress, but bring you no closer to achieving your goal. So, you spend a

lot of time doing relatively unimportant busywork for your business, but dont actually go

out and do the most important activity of all, sales. Or, you spend a lot of time reading art

magazines and visiting galleries, but dont actually paint. Or, you keep researching your

novel or thesis topic, but dont actually get around to writing it or you keep rewriting

the same chapter over and over again.

This kind of fake productivity is often exacerbated by perfectionism, one of the

four main habits of procrastination and, hence, one of the four main obstacles that

procrastinators must overcome to be able to do their work. (The other three are

negativity, hypersensitivity and panic.) I discuss these obstacles in depth in this e-book,

starting in Chapter 15.

And lets not forget procrastinations other valuable tool: its ability to thieve

time. So, you spend the day Web surfing, text messaging, listening to music, playing

video games, and hanging out with friends - or, alternatively, doing housework, running

errands, napping, and watching television - and then, all of a sudden, its ten p.m. and you

havent done any of your important work.

All of this adds up to the phenomenon Pressfield aptly describes as invisible

internalinsidiousimplacable... It keeps us stuck - unhappily, for sure, but at least

safely protected from the possibility of even more unhappiness.

It is clear that, to defeat procrastination, we need to understand more about ourwww.hillaryrettig.c

om/page 16

fears and our responses to those fears. Thats why the next few chapters are devoted to

the topic of fear and its typical causes and manifestations.


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Chapter 6.

Fear I. Introduction to Fear and Fear of Change

Our bravest organizers . . . plunged into darkness not because it was stylish or because

they were proud possessors of a theory that assured them that they were destined to win,

but because they decided to overcome fear, period.-Todd Gitlin, Letters to a Young

Activist

Fear, in itself, is not a bad thing - it can help keep us out of trouble. Just as it was

in our remote ancestors interest to be scared of terrain likely to harbor predators, it is in

our interest to be scared of certain risky situations.

The problem is when our fears are excessive, irrational or otherwise an

impediment to our growth and success - or, when we respond to fear in a suboptimal way

such as procrastinating. Fear is one of the strongest emotions: scientists even believe that

there is even a kind of early warning system in the amygdala (the part of the brain that

governs emotion) that allows us to experience fear before weve consciously become

aware of the thing we are afraid of. It makes sense: if a leopard is about to eat you, its a

good idea to feel fear, and react to that fear, as quickly as possible.

This early warning system may be the reason fear is such a difficult problem to

overcome, and why it can be so disabling. Its hard to do anything when youre afraid

other than to try to escape the thing that is frightening you.

If you have tried repeatedly and without success to break your procrastination

habit, then there is a good chance that fear lies at the heart of your failure. Furthermore,

you are unlikely to make much progress unless you first deal with your fear. The good

news is that, once you do that, progress can happen very quickly!

Below, and in the next few chapters, we examine the three most common fears at

the heart of procrastination: fear of change, fear of failure and fear of success.

Fear of Change

A key difference between successful and unsuccessful people is that successful


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people initiate and control more of the changes in their lives. They decide where theywww.hillaryret

tig.com/page 17

want to be today, this week, this month, next year, ten years from now, and thirty years

from now, and take actions designed to achieve that result. Unsuccessful people tend to

be more passive: they take what life, and other people, hand them, and consequently

often lead unhappy, embittered lives.

Of course, someone who is afraid of change is going to have a harder time

initiating and controlling it. That person may be a super-cautious or even pessimistic,

devil you know is better than the devil you dont, dont fix it if it aint broke, leave

well enough alone, let sleeping dogs lie kind of person. Moreover, he may have

perfectly good reasons for that mindset: people from troubled or deprived backgrounds,

for instance, often learn these kinds of lessons. But it is not a mindset likely to lead to

success in any ambitious endeavor.

As ambitious dreamers, we must work on our fear of change even more than most

people. This is especially true of activists, whose vocation is all about creating change.

Quoting Gandhi, we must become the change we want to see. Confucius agrees: To

put the world in order, we must first put the nation in order; to put the nation in order, we

must put the family in order; to put the family in order, we must cultivate our personal

life; and to cultivate our personal life, we must first set our hearts right.

To achieve your goals, you must overcome your fear of change.

Chapter 7.

Fear II. Fear of Failure

You have to have the courage to fail. - Russian political activist, and former world

chess champion, Garry Kasparov

Garry Kasparov is one of my heroes: a former world chess champion who, after

retiring, was not content to rest on his laurels, but has devoted himself to fighting

courageously to restore democracy in an increasingly authoritarian Russia. He does not

often come to the United States, so it was a treat for me to hear him speak, recently, at a


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church in Cambridge, MA. The place was packed with more than a thousand people

half, it seemed, from eastern Europe, and the other half nerdy guys clutching chess books

they wanted him to autograph. He spoke on the dynamics of success, and the main point

he kept coming back to was: You have to have the courage to fail. He also mentioned,

I have won hundreds of chess games...and lost thousands.

I went home thinking about how one doesnt become world chess championwww.hillaryrettig.com/

page 18

without being super-competitive and absolutely hating to lose, and yet here was Kasparov

talking about his thousands of losses - e.g., failures - and how they were essential to his

success.

If such a failure-averse man can have the courage to fail, so can I - and so can

you. Especially if you understand what failure really is.

If an action we take brings us the result we desired, or an even better one, we call

it a success. If not, we call it a failure. The trouble comes when we over-identify with

our projects, conflating their success or failure with our own as human beings.

Unfortunately, many people, and especially many procrastinators, do this all the time.

So, when our projects succeed, we dont just tell ourselves, Wow, I did that so well!

We say, Im fabulous, brilliant, queen of the world! And we frequently do feel like

queen of the world, at least for a little while.

Now, I dont have a problem with that. Most people spend way too much time

criticizing themselves, not to mention being criticized by others, and could use some

extra self-praise. The more, the merrier, as far as Im concerned: just keep it to yourself

so that you dont alienate others.

No, the problem isnt when our projects succeed; its when they fail. Then the

reverse happens, and we dont just tell ourselves, Bummer. I guess Ill have to do better

next time, but, Im such a loser. How could I possibly think I could own a business?

My folks were right - Im just lazy and stupid. Such negative thoughts are crippling, and

in many cases we are so terrified of the possibility that they are correct - that we really


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are stupid losers that we dont even dare to attempt our dream.

As Steven Pressfield puts it in The War of Art, Resistance knows that the

amateur composer will never write his symphony because he is overly invested in its

success and over-terrified of its failure. The amateur takes it so seriously it paralyzes

him.

Many procrastinators, in fact, have it even worse: they are comfortable taking

credit for their failures, but not their successes. So, failure is due to the persons own

limitations or ineptness, while success is due to luck or the supposedly trivial nature of

the challenge. (If the procrastinator succeeded at it, after all, it must be trivial.) Can you

imagine a more disabling attitude?

Most young children dont have this problem. A child whose tower of building

blocks falls down will cry, It fell down! not I failed! If anything, she is likely to

blame the blocks themselves, or some other kid who happened to walk too close to her

tower, which is why her disappointment is likely to be only temporary and she is able to

return happily and confidently to block-building the next day.

At some point, we all must learn to take responsibility for our failures and lookwww.hillaryrettig.com

/page 19

objectively at our personal limitations. Children raised with kindness and insight become

resilient adults who can do this without judging themselves harshly. Many of us,

however, were not treated so kindly by parents or others and, as a result, are unable to

refrain from harsh self-criticism. This makes us terrified of even the possibility of failure

and, thus, unable to take appropriate risks. And so we remain frozen:

*We dont leave a bad job in hopes of finding a better one.

*We dont leave a bad relationship in hopes of finding a better one.

*We dont take on ambitious projects, or dont finish the projects we take on.

*We dont move to a new, more interesting place.

In short, we remain stuck in our ruts.

Given procrastinations stealthy nature, of course, we usually dont tell ourselves


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were in a rut. On the contrary, we usually tell ourselves that we are trying really, really

hard to leave the job, relationship, etc. We just dont do a very good job of it.

Chapter 8.

Fear III. Fear of Success

Fear of failure is an intuitive concept - no one likes to fail. But what about fear of

success? How could anyone be afraid of success?

Consider this: failure, at least, usually has the virtue of leaving us in the same

place where we started out. Success, in contrast, takes us to someplace new and

unknown. And that is scary.

Moreover, the new place is likely to be busier, trickier, more difficult, more

confusing and less comfortable than the place we left behind:

*Finish your thesis and you will have to experience the judgment of your

committee, not to mention the vagaries of the academic job market.

*Run a successful activist campaign and youll wind up with more work to do. As

Saul Alinsky writes in Rules for Radicals, In the world as it is, the solution of each

problem inevitably creates a new one.

*Get a new job and youll have to master a whole new set of relationships,

information and skills.

*Get a new relationship and you put your heart on the line.

Success also always comes coupled with a new possibility of failure. Theres nowww.hillaryrettig.co

m/page 20

guarantee, after all, that youll prevail at your new challenges; and you could fall flat on

your face.

Success also puts you in the line of fire. Artists and academics both have to

endure their work being judged by experts and, sometimes, the wider community. And an

activist who succeeds at a campaign is likely to become a target for the opposition.

Finally, and perhaps hardest to take, is that your success may spark resentment

and even hostility from family and friends who dont support your goals, or who remain


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stuck in their own ruts. Dont underestimate this: rejection by, and alienation from, loved

ones is a common, and often very hurtful, consequence of success.

Success, in other words, is stressful, and sometimes greatly so. Children raised

with kindness and insight become resilient adults who can manage this stress, but many

of us were not treated so kindly by parents or others, and cannot. And so, we dont even

attempt to succeed.

If success is so risky and stressful, why even bother going for it? In On Becoming

a Novelist, John Gardner says: Nothing is harder than being a true novelist, unless that is

all one wants to be, in which case, though becoming a true novelist is hard, everything

else is harder. Same for all the other types of ambitious dreamers.

On a more prosaic level, success usually brings monetary rewards - even for the

activist, who may finally have a shot at getting a coveted full-time job in his movement.

Then there are the social and spiritual benefits of success: one of the best situations

anyone can find themselves in is as part of a community of successful ambitious

dreamers. So, while your new successful life may be busier and more stressful than your

old one, it will also be richer (in every sense), more interesting and more fulfilling. Your

new friends and colleagues will not only support you through the stressful times, but

encourage you along to even greater heights of success and happiness.

Chapter 9.

No Such Thing as Pure Failure or Success

A few years ago, during the high tech boom of the late 1990s, I started a high tech

business into which, over three years, I sank every penny I had saved. This represented an

enormous financial hit for my family. But the business never took off and, looking back, I

can see that it never took off because of mistakes that I made.

Was the business a failure?

At the time it certainly felt that way. When the money ran out and I had to take awww.hillaryrettig.c

om/page 21

job, I was hugely depressed - and who could blame me? After all, a few months earlier I


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had been visualizing myself as a titan of the new economy. Now, I was scraping by as a

business coach at a nonprofit agency.

But guess what: I dont see it as a failure any more.

First of all, I learned a vast amount from that business failure so much so that I

refer to the experience, jokingly, as my MBA.

Second, the coaching job I took out of desperation turned out to be one of the best

experiences of my life, and it changed my life for the better in many ways. I turned out to

be better at coaching than at most of the other ways I had tried to earn a living; I was

helping a lot of people; and also my students and fellow coaches turned out to be some of

the most amazing and inspirational people Ive ever been privileged to know. As a result

of helping people work through their problems and blocks on a daily basis, I found

myself undergoing a period of rapid personal growth and learning; and I was even able,

in a kind of extraordinary coachs alchemy, to transform my business failure, along

with prior business successes, into useful fodder for my classes and coaching, thus

deriving real and ongoing value from an experience that at the time seemed like pure

failure.

Ultimately, the chain of events set in place by my business failure led to the

writing and publication of my first book, The Lifelong Activist, and my new, wonderful -

and sustainable coaching and speaking business.

So, was my business a failure? Only in the narrowest sense.

Stephen Pressfield tells a wonderful story about failure in The War of Art. After

seventeen years of trying to break into the movie business, he finally wrote a screenplay

that got produced, for a movie called King Kong Lives. (If you havent heard of it, you

can probably guess the rest of the story . . . .) We were certain it was a blockbuster, he

writes; and he and his colleagues arranged for a fancy party after the premiere. No one

came to the party, however, and the next day the reviews were scathing. Pressfield writes:

I was crushed. Here I was, forty-two years old, divorced, childless, having given up all


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normal human pursuits to chase the dream of being a writer . . . .Im a loser, a phony; my

life is worthless, and so am I. However, he was quickly set right by a wise friend, who

said, Be happy. Youre where you wanted to be, arent you? So youre taking a few

blows. Thats the price for being in the arena and not on the sidelines. Stop complaining

and be grateful.

One moral of Pressfields story, and my own, is that there is no such thing as pure

success or pure failure. Every experience, including my business and King Kong Lives, is

a mixed bag. (Now you know why I frequently put the words failure and success in

quotes throughout this e-book.) Of course, success is better than failure, but mostwww.hillaryrettig.

com/page 22

successes contain some element of compromise or failure, and most failures contain some

element of success, even if that element may not be immediately apparent. So the line

between the two is not nearly as clear as many people think.

No Regrets

In my coaching, I regularly run into people who feel a deep shame for some, or

many, of their past actions. Sometimes, the sin is having dropped out of college, while

other times it is having remained in an abusive relationship, spent ones twenties drunk or

stoned, or committed a crime (or crimes). Often, the sin is something most onlookers

would consider relatively minor, or not even a sin at all - like my student who had to stop

doing volunteer work at her church when her child became ill. (Believe it or not, she was

deeply ashamed of this.) Many people are filled with shame for things they did back

when they were teenagers or even younger, or for things that other people did to them.

And in many cases that I see, peoples shame and regret are keeping them

frozen and unable to make progress on their goals.

Shame, guilt, regret and remorse are toxic, and useless, emotions. The only

proper response to your mistakes is to learn from them, work to ensure that you do

not repeat them, make whatever amends you can to people you have hurt, and move

on. Anything else - any shame, guilt, regret or remorse - wont accomplish anything,


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and can, in fact, lead to a pernicious form of procrastination. Sure, I could choose to

dwell on the many mistakes I made in my business, not to mention all the money I lost.

But what exactly would that accomplish? (A non-rhetorical question: think about it.)

Once the relevant lessons are learned, and youve made amends as best as can, its time

to move on.

******

Exercise: Finding the Success in Failure

Re-examine some of your worst, most shameful failures and see if you can

locate the successes hidden within. Give yourself credit for those successes: you earned

them the hard way. And stop dwelling over your failures: youve probably done that

enough, already, to last a lifetime.

******www.hillaryrettig.com/page 23

Chapter 10.

Dont Compound Fear With Shame

In my experience, many people, and especially many men, are ashamed of their

fears. They see them as disgraceful and a sign of weakness.

I disagree. As humans, we are subject to death, disease, disappointment, loss,

heartbreak, natural disaster and human-made disaster, among many other afflictions. Fear

is, in my view, an entirely reasonable response to this reality.

Then there are the many hardships, risks and rejections of the ambitious life,

whether it involves art, academics, activism, entrepreneurship or some other goal. These

hardships and risks give you even more reason to be afraid.

In other words, to paraphrase the old activist quip about outrage, If youre not

afraid, then you havent been paying attention.

So stop blaming yourself for your fears and start asking yourself this question

instead: How should I respond to my fears?

Steven Pressfield tells how the late actor Henry Fonda suffered from extreme


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stage fright throughout his long career. In fact, he got so nervous before every stage

performance and film shoot that he threw up. Thats forty years of throwing up.

And after every episode of throwing up, he proceeded to give his performance.

Thats how to respond to fear: not by letting it paralyze you, and not by wasting

time blaming yourself for it, but by doing your work and making progress toward your

goals.

******

Exercise: Experiencing Fear Without Shame

Take two or three tasks you have been procrastinating on and for each write a list

of the negative consequences of accomplishing it. If, for example, youve been

procrastinating on visiting a doctor, your list could include, It will cost $100, Shell

give me a shot, and She might discover something seriously wrong.

After doing this exercise, two things might happen:

*You might find yourself becoming more understanding about, and forgiving of,

your procrastination. (No wonder I keep putting this off!) This is a much betterwww.hillaryrettig.co

m/page 24

response than criticizing or blaming yourself.

*By writing down the negatives, you may defuse them, so that they seem less

scary. You may even feel motivated to go ahead and do the task. If thats the case, go for

it! But dont feel bad if you dont experience that motivation, or if it quickly goes away

and youre back to feeling stuck again.

Whatever you do, do not put yourself down for having fears and anxieties.

Everyone has them, including highly successful people who often consciously or

unconsciously develop skills and strategies for coping with them. Thats what youll

learn to do in future chapters of this book.

******

Chapter 11.

Fear Creates Obstacles to Success


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Common solutions to logistical obstacles include: doing mission management and

time management, organizing your office, buying some new equipment, taking a class,

and setting up regular consultations with mentors.

Once you commit to overcoming a logistical obstacle, it is often not difficult to do

so. If you do have trouble overcoming yours - if you seem to lack the willpower to

make the solution work, or cant even find the time to think about the problem - then you

probably also suffer from fear-based procrastination. (This will be the case for most

people.) Youll probably have to deal with the fear first, using the techniques described

later in this e-book, before you can move on to the more superficial logistical fix.

There are also what I call Situational Obstacles, which involve other people or

other circumstances outside your full control. A tough day job, heavy family

responsibilities, and an unsupportive spouse are situational obstacles. So are a disability

and serious health problems.

Situational obstacles are often the toughest to overcome. Their solutions often

involve major life changes such as switching jobs, leaving relationships, altering

lifestyles, compromising on ones cherished goals, or committing to individual or

couples therapy. Like logistical obstacles, situational obstacles usually occur alongside

fear-based procrastination, and so youll first have to deal at least partly with your fears

before you can effectively start changing your situation. But even once you work past the

fear, you are still left having to deal with some very tough circumstances.

Chapter 12.

The Most Important Thing You Need to Know About Your Obstacles

The most important thing you need to know about your obstacles is that all of

them can be overcome.

It doesnt matter who you are, how you were raised, what race, religion,

nationality or sex you are, or how much money you have. All of your obstacles can bewww.hillaryret

tig.com/page 26

overcome.


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Overcoming an obstacle may not be easy. It may not be fun. It may take months,

years or even decades. It may take time and money. But it can be done.

Your habits of perfectionism, negativity, hypersensitivity and panic can be

overcome.

Your logistical obstacles - lack of preparation, information, support - can be

overcome.

Your situational obstacles - bad job, bad relationships, disability or chronic illness

- can be overcome, at least in part.

Ill say it again: ALL of your obstacles can be overcome.

By overcome, I mean eliminated, minimized or compensated for. You may

have a disability that you must live with, or have experienced a terrible loss from which

the hurt will never entirely go away. But you can still work to at least minimize the

negative effect of your misfortune on your future success. One of my heroes in this

regard is Christopher Reeve, the late actor who was paralyzed from the neck down in a

horseback-riding accident. Suicidal immediately after the accident, and afterward unable

even to breathe without the help of a respirator, he rallied to become a celebrated activist

and author who provided hope, help and inspiration to millions around the globe.

True, Reeve was a movie star who had certain advantages. So, lets look at Victor

Frankl, an ordinary, non-celebrity doctor who was imprisoned in Auschwitz and other

concentration camps during World War II. He later wrote a best-selling book about his

experiences, Mans Search for Meaning, in which he reported that, even in the

concentration camps, It was possible for spiritual life to deepen . . . .The intensification

of inner life helped the prisoner find a refuge from the emptiness, desolation, and spiritual

poverty of his existence. In one incredible scene, Frankl describes how, in the midst of a

terrifying nighttime forced march, he called up the memory of his wife, whom he hadnt

seen in years, and how her memory brought him peace.

I understood how a man who has nothing left in this world still may know bliss, be it


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only for a brief moment, in the contemplation of his beloved. In a position of utter

desolation, when man cannot express himself in positive action, when his only

achievement may consist of enduring his sufferings in the right way-an honorable way-in

such a position man can, through loving contemplation of the image he carries of his

beloved, achieve fulfillment.

(Frankl later learned that his wife had died in Bergen-Belsen in 1945.)

Frankl teaches us that, even in the midst of the most horrific oppression, we canwww.hillaryrettig.co

m/page 27

still maintain a degree of control over our thoughts and move them in a positive direction

- and that doing so can increase our odds not just for success, but survival itself.

Did I say that all of your obstacles can be overcome? What I really meant to say is

that all of your obstacles must be overcome. Because what other choice, really, do you

have? Failure to overcome your obstacles leads to a life of bitterness and wasted

potential.

The process of overcoming your obstacles is the very essence of the human

journey. If youve been procrastinating a long time, you are probably demoralized and

have lost sight of your strengths, talents and virtues. Once you stop running from your

obstacles and start working to overcome them, you will reclaim those positive qualities

and also probably discover some wonderful new ones. This process of reclamation and

growth is one of lifes most awesome and joyful experiences.

Remember: all of your obstacles must be overcome.

Chapter 13.

Non-Obstacles

Often, my students raise points such as the below to explain their failure to

pursue, or make progress on, their ambitious dream:

*I dont have enough money.

*I dont have time.

*I dont have transportation / a spare room in my home / a computer / etc.


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Not having something you need to succeed, such as money, time or

transportation, is not an obstacle: its a solvable problem.

So start solving it.

When pressed, my student without money can come up with a plan for lowering

her daily living expenses, leaving her more money with which to pursue her dream. With

her mentors help, she can also think up ways she can achieve her dream more cheaply. If

she wants to start a business, for example, she can set up a home office instead of renting

an outside one, and furnish it with used, cheap furniture instead of new. If she needs

equipment or supplies she cant afford, she can arrange a barter, or take out a low-interest

business loan.

Lowering your living expenses is always a good idea, as it not only leaves you

with more money but often creates more time. It could, for instance, allow you to support

yourself on a part-time day job - thats the path many ambitious dreamers take when theirwww.hilla

ryrettig.com/page 28

dream cant financially sustain them. Even working four days a week, versus five, can

make a big difference! Or, if you must have a full-time job, lowering your expenses could

permit you to take a lower-paying, but easier, one (say, one with flextime, a short

commute, and a lighter workload), instead of a higher-paying but harder one that saps

your time and energy.

How about my student without time? He can use time management techniques

(see The Lifelong Activist) to see if he can reclaim even a few hours of his weekly

schedule. (Most people can, by the way.) And he can come up with a plan for breaking

his big project down into smaller pieces that his schedule can more easily accommodate.

And my student without transportation? When pressed, she recalls that there is

public transportation that can cover her route, a friend who can lend her a car, or that she

can take the occasional taxi without breaking the bank.

Two things to note, from these examples:

1) The solutions to the problems were actually quite simple and even, in


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hindsight, obvious. Solutions usually are, once you stop dithering and actually start

looking for them. (See Chapter 22.) Remember: focus on the solution, not the problem.

2) Many of the solutions are, as my technical friends say, sub-optimal. Few

people like having to cut back on their budgets, get used instead of new furniture, or

commit to a long, daily bus ride. But whats the alternative? You can sit around hoping

that youll win the lottery or that things will otherwise magically change, but hope, as

they say, is not a strategy. The above compromises and sacrifices are, in fact, highly

characteristic of those that ambitious people make to achieve their goals. All around you,

people are making them, and without that much of a fuss, in the hopes of one day living a

happier and more fulfilled life. A key difference between successful and unsuccessful

people is that the former often view barriers to success as petty inconveniences or

exciting challenges, while the latter often view those same barriers as huge and

insurmountable.

How you view your own barriers will go a long way toward determining how

successful you will be. Its glib, but true: your attitude really does determine your

altitude.

Chapter 14.

Beware of Myths that Promote and Excuse Failure

Another set of barriers that ambitious dreamers face are the many condescendingwww.hillaryrettig.

com/page 29

and undermining myths that promote and excuse their dysfunction and unhappiness.

Artists, for instance, frequently hear messages such as these, both from their enemies

and supporters:

One must suffer to be a great artist: if youre happy, you must be a shallow or

uncommitted person.

Poverty is a sign of virtue and commitment to ones art: earning money is selling

out. And,

Art is okay when youre young, but when are you going to get a real job?


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Activists hear similarly destructive messages:

You cant have a personal life - theres too much work to be done.

If youre happy, you must be a shallow, uncommitted person. How you can be

happy with so much suffering in the world?

Poverty is a sign of virtue and commitment to ones cause: earning money is

selling out. And,

Activists are nave dreamers. Activism is something you grow out of.

Entrepreneurs have it somewhat easier, since our society at least pretends to

celebrate entrepreneurship. What it typically celebrates, however, is a shallow, idealized,

glamorized vision of it that has little to do with reality. Often, the media play up the easy

or spectacular overnight successes or rags to riches stories that are far from the norm.

The media also tends to downplay struggles or failures except when those can be used to

provide glamorous contrast to a spectacular success, and to deemphasize the role of luck

in business success. (More on all of this in Chapter 20.)

Academics typically dont suffer from the same sorts of damaging myths as

artists, activists and entrepreneurs, in my experience, although they do suffer from a

general disdain for academic achievement in this country. It can be hard to persevere in

the face of such disdain, particularly when members of your family share it. Beyond that,

many academics suffer from inadequate mentoring, especially during the thesis-writing

process.

Finally, a problem that afflicts all categories of ambitious dreamers is our

societys promotion of the myth of the solitary, usually emotionally-tortured,

achiever/creator. That can reinforce an unhealthy and anti-productive tendency toward

isolation, a topic I at discuss at length in Chapter 18.

If you believe in one or more of the above myths, your belief is probably standingwww.hillaryrettig.c

om/page 30

in the way of both your professional success and your ability to lead a happy life. Try

writing out your thoughts and feelings around the myth: you will probably discover that it


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doesnt survive the light of close scrutiny and objective, dispassionate analysis. Also, see

Chapter 22 for more on how these kinds of distortions can foster a procrastination

problem.

Weve now finished our discussion of the general role of fear plays in

procrastination. Now lets delve more deeply into fears most common manifestations,

the Big Four obstacles of Perfectionism, Negativity, Hypersensitivity and Panic.

Well tackle them one at a time.

Chapter 15.

Perfectionism

Perfectionism is the feeling that the things we do or create are never quite good

enough. Perfectionists hold themselves to an unreasonably high standard for success, and

then, when they perceive themselves as failing to meet that standard, judge themselves

harshly. They also often inflict that same behavior on others, holding them to an

unreasonably high standard and judging them harshly when they fail.

More specifically, perfectionists:

*Refuse to acknowledge the incremental nature of creation: that it happens in

stages and that the early stages are likely to be rough and unsatisfying. In fact, they think

their early efforts should be fabulous. They often dont think this consciously - its a

viewpoint, after all, that doesnt make sense - but unconsciously or semi-consciously,

they are thinking, The first draft of this paper ought to be fantastic.

*Underestimate the difficulty of their projects, e.g., Ill just hang up a few fliers,

and that should fill the room for my event.

*Set ridiculously high or impossible goals, e.g., Im going to write fifty pages of

my thesis this weekend despite the fact that theyve never written more than eight pages

in a day, and also have numerous other obligations.

*Tend to see things in black and white: total success or total failure. They dont

understand that doing half of a job - or even one-tenth - is way better than doing nothing.


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After all, if you do just a tiny bit of a job every day, you will eventually finish it. But if

you do none of a job every day, you never will. Emotionally, if not intellectually,

procrastinators dont get the difference.www.hillaryrettig.com/page 31

Perfectionists, above all, see work as a kind of epic struggle. They dont quite

trust success when it comes too easily. Because of that, they often do things that make

their work harder, such as choosing unreasonably hard projects (meaning, projects they

are too inexperienced to handle, or that they dont have the time, resources or support to

complete effectively); framing their projects in monumental terms; and adding

unnecessary tasks to projects.

Perfectionism is the voice in your head that says that no matter what youve done,

its not enough, or not good enough. Its the voice that makes unreasonable demands for

productivity, and dismisses your reasonable explanations for not having produced more.

When you tell perfectionism, for instance, that you couldnt do your art today because

you worked at your day job all day and came home exhausted, perfectionism reminds you

of some exceptional achiever who was in exactly your situation - or a worse one - and

still managed to create award-winning art. Of course, perfectionism conveniently tends to

omit key details, such as that that achiever may have held an easier job than you do, or

had fewer personal responsibilities, or shirked whatever responsibilities she did have.

Perfectionism is shaming, blaming and guilt-inducing. It is, according to writer

Anne Lamont, the voice of the oppressor, and it correlates strongly with what I call the

Mean Mommy/Mean Daddy voice, which I discuss at length in Chapter 20.

Listening to that voice is always a mistake.

The Solution

Defeating perfectionism is a four-step process: (1) choosing the right project; (2)

choosing the right goal; (3) choosing the right process; and (4) choosing the right

thoughts.

Choosing the right project means choosing the easiest and shortest project,


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especially if youre doing something for the first time. You do this, first, to counteract

your procrastinators tendency to make projects harder, and second, so that you have the

best possible chance of actually beating your procrastination problem and finishing. Its a

lot easier to finish a slender novel or thesis than a giant tome, for instance, and once

youve completed your small work, you can then go on to tackle larger ones, if you wish.

But if you begin with a giant project, you may never finish it, and your career might be

over before it begins.

Ditto for business, activism or any other ambitious endeavor: choose small, easy

projects until you feel more in control of your procrastination problem. Easy will vary

depending on your particular circumstances, of course, and you should always consult

with your mentors to make sure youre choosing wisely.www.hillaryrettig.com/page 32

If you choose a properly small project, there will likely be a small voice in your

head telling you that its too small and trivial; that you should be more ambitious, less

cowardly, etc. Thats the voice of perfectionism, a.k.a. the oppressor, a.k.a. the Mean

Mommy/Daddy. What that voice wont tell you is that: (a) you have to walk before you

run (i.e., complete a small project before attempting a larger one); and (b) even a small

novel, thesis, business, gallery show, performance, activist campaign, etc., is plenty big

enough project.

So ignore the perfectionist voice and stick with the small project.

Then, you need to choose the right goal, which should be, simply, to finish.

Not to write a fabulous book, achieve a spectacular result from your campaign, or make a

million dollars from your business. No: your goal should simply be to get done whatever

it is that you are trying to do. Dont worry about quality: just do your best and the quality,

which is an engrained part of your psyche, will be there. And - very importantly - dont

aim for a perfect result: just relax around the inevitability that your work, like all human

endeavors, will contain both strengths and weaknesses. (For a more in-depth discussion

of this point specific to writing, download my essay How to Finish Your Book from


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http://www.hillaryrettig.com.)

Choosing the right process means breaking your already-small project down into

even smaller pieces that you can easily handle. It also means getting loads of support

from family, friends, mentors, colleagues and others, including not just support with the

project itself, but emotional support, and also help with childcare and chores you would

normally be responsible for, but that use up time and energy you need to complete your

project. Support also means donations of space, equipment, services or supplies your

project requires.

Support means, in other words, as much help, of all kinds, as possible. Most

perfectionists dont realize the intense level of support needed to succeed at most

ambitious endeavors, in part because of those aforementioned myths of easy success, but

also in part because of the perfectionist tendency not to look for solutions but to simply to

blame oneself. But the more support, the better.

Finally, we come to choosing the right thoughts. Perfectionism, you recall, is a

anti-productive response to fear, so it is important that you learn to replace your

perfectionist thoughts with more functional ones. Here are three examples:

Replace this perfectionist thought: Im going to get 50 pages of my novel done

this weekend. [Unspoken thought: If I dont accomplish that, Im lazy and a loser.]

With this more functional one: Given my writing speed and also my other

commitments, Im going to aim to get ten pages done this weekend.

Replace this perfectionist thought: Ill just send out a few postcards about mywww.hillaryrettig.co

m/page 33

upcoming music performance and that should be enough to fill the room. Ill bet I sell 30

CDs! [Unspoken thought: If I dont accomplish that, Im a loser, and the people in this

town are stupid and anti-music.]

With this more functional one: Ill send out postcards and email announcements

to my mailing list of 500 people. Also, Ill ask the club Im playing at to send an

announcement to their list as well. They told me theyve got 800 people on their list, so


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all told thats 1,300 people well be contacting. In the past Ive gotten 2 - 3 people out of

every 100 emails I send out to come to performances, so for those 1,300 announcements I

should expect about 26 39 people. And I usually sell 1 CD per 13 people, so I should

count on selling three or four CDs.

Replace this perfectionist thought: Why is my house such an awful mess? I

know my family thinks - and I think - that Im lazy and disorganized. And my mom

looked at me like she thought I was a bad mom when I told her that we get take-out three

nights a week. [Unspoken thought: Im a bad homemaker and parent.]

With this more functional one: Well, there are only 24 hours in a day, and Im

not willing to spend more than a couple of them cleaning and cooking. Its crazy to

expect someone with kids, a job and a growing business to have a house thats as clean as

the house of someone who doesnt have a job or business! My house is clean enough,

and anyone who thinks otherwise is welcome to come over and clean it themselves!

You change your thoughts simply by consciously interrupting your perfectionist

thoughts, and replacing them with their more functional equivalent. At first, this may

seem contrived - and you may frequently forget to do it - but keep trying and eventually

youll see that replacing perfectionist with non-perfectionist thoughts feels good and

doesnt hurt anyone.

You can get started doing this right now. Dont set yourself the perfectionist goal

catching every single perfectionist thought (!), and dont berate yourself harshly when

you miss one or otherwise slip up. Just start out casually by keeping that goal in the back

of your mind and whenever you do happen to successfully replace a perfectionist thought

with a functional one, congratulate yourself. Soon, the replacements will happen so often,

and so automatically, that you wont even notice them. And, eventually, your thoughts

will become less perfectionist, so that you wont have to do much replacing at all.

Chapter 16.

Negativitywww.hillaryrettig.com/page 34


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******

Exercise: Name Your Strengths

Before reading this chapter, take a few minutes and do this preliminary exercise:

On a sheet of paper, list the strengths, skills, talents and other positive qualities you bring

to your project. These could be anything from the mundane-seeming, but vastly

underrated, Im punctual, to the pragmatic, Im good with computers, to the more

global, Im a social visionary, or anything in between. Dont be shy or modest: come

up with as long a list as you can. You neednt show it to anyone. Keep the list near you

while reading this chapter; Ill be discussing it soon.

******

Remember the musician from the previous chapter who over-optimistically

thought she could fill the room for her performance at a local club simply by sending

out a few postcards? Lets say she followed that plan, with predictable results: only a

handful of people showed up to hear her play.

There are two basic ways one can react to this kind of disappointing situation.

Here is one:

What a disaster. Im such a dope, a complete loser. I always screw up. I dont

even know why I bother to try. And this town - its full of jerks. Theyre too

dumb to appreciate real music, and theyre cheap, too - I only sold two CDs. And

the club manager must think Im a jerk, too. Im sure hell never let me perform

there again. I feel like crap. I just cant stand it. Im going to get a quart of ice-

cream and rent a bad movie and crawl into bed.

And heres the other:

Darn! This is so disappointing. I guess I screwed up by not promoting the gig

more. Oh, well: Im kind of embarrassed in front of my friends who did show up,

and also the club manager, but no ones really been hurt. The manager seemed to

like my music, so maybe if I promise to do a lot more promotion next time, hell


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let me perform again. In any case, no matter where my next gig is, I now know I

need to promote the heck out of it. So it wasnt a total loss... Oh, and I did sell a

couple of CDs, and I also met that really cool guitarist from the next town

over...he said he knew some the managers at some other clubs, and could referwww.hillaryrettig.co

m/page 35

me. So that was a terrific break! Anyhow, Im still feeling kind of low so Im

going to take a break and have fun. I know! Ill call my friend Deb and see if she

wants to hang out.

For many procrastinators, the first monologue will seem much more familiar than

the second, because many procrastinators are negativists who tend to see themselves,

their accomplishments, and everyone and everything around them as less good, or much

worse, than they actually are:

*Where the objective person sees success, the negativist sees neutrality.

*Where the objective person sees neutrality, the negativist sees failure.

*Where the objective person sees failure, the negativist sees extreme failure.

Negativity is a serious problem for anyone, but particularly for ambitious

dreamers, for three reasons:

First, it is undermining. The nature of ambitious dreams are that they are tough to

achieve and thus require a lot of perseverance. Anything that discourages you is a

problem - and negativity is hugely discouraging.

Second, negativity impairs your objectivity and causes you to misread people and

situations. Therefore, you are bound to make erroneous assumptions - for instance, that

the club manager will never let you perform again - that lead to counterproductive

actions. Negativity, in other words, frequently becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy.

Thirdly, negativity is isolating. Negativists often believe they are being realistic or

pragmatic, but people with a healthy world view recognize negativity for what it is - a

sign of insecurity and a disabling force - and flee from it. When that happens, it often

deepens the negativists insecurities and reinforces her tendency toward negativity and


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isolation, so that the problem compounds itself. Notice how the negative person in our

example retreats to her bed with a quart of ice cream, while the more objective person

seeks out the support of a friend?

All ambitious dreamers can be afflicted by negativism, but the risk is probably

highest for activists, since they have to do battle not just with their own dark side, but the

worlds. Famed activist Todd Gitlin warns against this tendency in his book Letters to a

Young Activist: Just because you let the dark side of the world into your nervous system

doesnt mean that you have to surrender to gloom, which in any case is never as justified

as it thinks. Ive actually heard discussions, among activists, on whether it is ever

appropriate to say weve won on a particular issue or event, given that all victories are

temporary or partial. Come on! If you cant claim your victories, then what are youwww.hillaryrettig.

com/page 36

working for? And how do you hope to inspire others? Do sports teams not celebrate their

victories because they know they could have won by a wider margin, or could lose the

next game? Of course not! They know that owning ones successes is crucial. And, of

course, many of the same activists who are so reluctant to declare victory seem to have

no problem at all declaring defeat, so its clear that theyre not being objective so much

as negative.

Which brings us to the next section...

The Opposite of Negativity is NOT Delusional Positiveness

Please note that I am not talking about adopting a delusionally positive,

Pollyanna-ish everythings just peachy attitude. Im also not talking about disabling

your critical faculties or setting low expectations for yourself. Im talking about being

an objective observer and evaluator of both the negative and positive elements of

yourself and your work, as well as those around you, their work, and society in

general. Many negative people have trouble grasping the distinction between objectivity

and delusional positiveness: when I tell them to be more objective, they think Im telling

them to ignore all the bad stuff. Do you expect me to walk around like a giggling idiot?


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they ask. Do you want me to LIE to myself? Certainly not! But it is not objective or

honest to focus on just the negative elements of a situation. This distinction seems pretty

obvious, but if a person has a serious negativity problem, I often have to work with them

for a while to get them to see it. We typically do an Abbot-and-Costello type routine that

goes something like this:

Student: Youre asking me to ignore all the bad stuff.

Hillary: No, Im asking you to pay attention to the bad stuff AND the good

stuff.

S (agitatedly): But if I go too easy on myself [or my employees, or my kids],

nothing will get done!

H: Im not saying to go easy. Im saying to pay attention to both the bad stuff

and the good stuff, not just the bad.

S: But people need to be held accountable!

H: Im not talking about not holding people accountable. Im talking about

owning the good stuff along with the bad.

And on and on...

Eventually, most people get it. www.hillaryrettig.com/page 37

The Negativists View of Self

Negativists tend to be harshest on themselves.

As a coach, I get to witness this phenomenon at close range and it never ceases to

amaze me. The most talented and impressive people often see themselves as failures, and

drag a heavy burden of shame along with them wherever they go. Many of my students

put themselves down in big and small ways as a matter of course. Their conversations are

peppered with expressions that undervalue their achievements, such as, Its not such a

big deal, or, I didnt really do that much, or Anyone could have done that. Even the

ubiquitous, I cant do math, usually turns out to be wrong, and is therefore an example

of negativity.


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Some students are so divorced from their strengths, skills, talents and

accomplishments that I have to conduct the equivalent of an archaeological dig to help

them build a resume or biographical sketch reflecting their true skills and

accomplishments. Well sit for hours facing each other across a desk, with me

interviewing them on their past experiences and writing up all their positives - many of

which they dont even initially recognize as such. Often, when we are done, they are

surprised to see how much they have really accomplished.

A truly adept negativist can even turn even a stellar accomplishment into a failure.

One day, I asked a student who had an MBA what school he had gotten it from, and he

replied Northwestern Universitys Kellogg School of Management. Thats a top school,

so I congratulated him. His self-deprecating, negativist response amazed me: Oh, its

only the third or fourth best school.

How big a negativist are YOU? Look at the Name Your Strengths list you created

before starting this chapter. (If you didnt create it, stop and create it now, before you

read on.)

If you listed twenty to thirty strengths, skills, talents, and other positive qualities,

you did pretty well.

If you listed ten to twenty strengths, skills and talents, you did OK.

If you listed five to ten strengths, skills and talents, you did average. When I do

this exercise in classes, most students respond within this range.

If you listed zero to five strengths, skills and talents, you did poorly, but youve

got lots of company. There are always a few people in every class who can think of few

or no good things to say about themselves. Computer geeks, engineers, scientists and

other technical types seem to disproportionately fall into this group, by the way. I think

thats due to the fact that technical people are often trained to focus on the flaws in their

projects so that they can then fix them. That flaw-finding tendency comes in handy whenwww.hillar

yrettig.com/page 38

youre designing a computer program or a bridge, but is less useful in the personal or


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interpersonal realm.

My own Name Your Strengths list, which I keep on my computer and regularly

print out, review and add to, currently includes more than eighty items. That is not

because Im some kind of prodigy or egomaniac, but simply because I work hard to

recognize all my talents and strengths, and am not embarrassed to admit them to myself. I

sometimes share my list with my students, who, by the way, are frequently amused to

find humility listed among the dozens of other paeans to myself. They also see entries

such as loves animals and not a slave to fashion along with the more standard fare

such as smart and good with computers. We typically define success too narrowly,

for reasons I will explain in the next chapter, and that often leads us to ignore some of our

more interesting and useful qualities. But why not include them? Who knows when they

wont come in handy? The fact that I love animals seemed irrelevant for years, for

instance, until I started doing animal activism.

Make no mistake: Name Your Strengths is an important exercise. If you do not

recognize and own your strengths, skills and talents, how can you use them to build your

success? And if you go around feeling devoid of those qualities, how are you going to

have the confidence to follow through on an ambitious plan?

Go back now and see what you can add to your list. Then, talk to family, friends

and mentors and see what they would add to it. You will probably be amazed at all the

good traits others see in you that you never suspected.

Once youve created the list, keep it handy, review and add to it frequently, and

(privately) celebrate your strengths. That small effort will go a long way toward helping

you succeed.

******

Exercise: Create Your Life Resume

Reinforce your sense of your own talents and accomplishments by creating a Life

Resume. It resembles a normal, professional resume, but also includes experiences and


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accomplishments from beyond your work life - for example, from your family life, home

life, friendships, art, activism, volunteer or civic activities, mental or physical health, or

any other area that is important to you.

Needless to say, do not write down any of your perceived failures, flaws and

weaknesses. You wouldnt do that on a normal resume, so why would you do it here?

In a Life Resume, none of your achievements is devalued or unworthy of note. Ifwww.hillaryrettig.co

m/page 39

youve . . .

*created a pleasant and welcoming home

*been a wonderful friend/partner/parent/child/guardian

*enjoyed a passionate hobby such as cooking or gardening

*developed a distinctive personal style

*made terrific art or mus

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