 Guys, I'm going to show you The solution for procrastination that came to me after many many years of struggling self-sabotage huge frustration huge degrees of guilt and shame and Really this approach you could put it this way. It's about Retraining your nervous system It's about retraining it to be more cooperative with you know doing the things that we want to do for a long time mine was I was caught up in a lot of conflict inner conflict about doing things not doing things shame about not doing things and You know wanting to push myself harder now spoiler alert here to begin with It's not about pushing yourself harder. In fact, it's actually the opposite of that Because the nervous system doesn't respond well to threat. It just makes it dig in even more and stay in its defensive position But what I'm going to do here? I'm going to read a question and this question is from Daniel and I wanted to share this question because It's really going to help a lot of people I think because so many of us have this This was the problem I had in the past and so many people I work with have this issue So I'm going to show you Daniel's question and then I'm going to show you a technique for procrastination And it's a very very practical technique It's counter-intuitive, but if you try it for a little while you'll find that it's it's going to be helpful So let's take a look here at Daniel's question to begin and Daniel says I know David that you've said in the past that the Little have to voice which is that voice that bullies us and pushes us all the time This have to voice is the thing that causes procrastination Which is true. I have said that in the past and I'm going to get to that a little bit more here in a moment You will also say we should drop it or question it, but I can't convince myself of this So this Daniel is finding it difficult to challenge your question this little voice this belief system that relies on have to I Just believe there are things I have to do How can I even go about? Questioning this belief when it seems so strong, and this is why I wanted to share This question what you and Daniel has asked me to do this video here And I'm going to show a technique is no willpower involved. In fact All you need is a little bit of boundary control to step away from something rather than to do something Okay, and if you can if you can grasp this concept I've made other videos in this, but I'll keep kind of explaining that may be in different ways but if you can grasp this concept the emotional freedom and Really above all the resolution to inner conflict goes away, and that's really what we're after here So let's just workshop this here together for a little while. Okay, and see if we can come up with a really understanding of why This this paralysis kicks in why this procrastination shows up here So if we take a look at this right? Essentially procrastination comes down to this It's a conflict within ourselves. Okay, so what we have in this conflict is we have To a kind of a mind that is at war with itself Okay, and we're right in the middle and we've been torn apart between the two of them Well, we want to do with the solution and this is very abstract. This is not the technique I'm just giving you a little overview here What we want to do is get into a unified mind that is not split that is not At war with itself. It's unified the resolution to it. Okay, there's peace Now on one hand when we have procrastination we have one little voice That says I don't want to do it or even I can't do it. It might even say things like look It's hopeless. It'll be no good now. Anyway, it's an undermining kind of voice And of course when we're in that little mentality We're gonna have a lot of shame and we're gonna also feel stuck and stagnation. Okay, but main thing is shame or guilt We're gonna feel in that Now if we were to just accept that That'd be that it wouldn't be a good situation to be in at all And in fact, many of us do find ourselves stuck in that situation But procrastination is slightly different because the other side of the equation is this You have to do it Okay, this is our our bully you could call it the the inner critic and Not only does it say you have to do it But it's going to make threats against you sometimes and it'll it'll hold these terrible consequences over you if you don't do it Right and sometimes those come in the form of visual images that you might see in your future for instance, right? now So if in one hand, I didn't look I don't want to do it and I don't want to say and you have to do it You can see that there is it this is what we mean by a mind at war with itself two different parts two different motives Pulling each other apart and you're stuck right in the middle and that looks like paralysis or stagnation. You just can't move Okay feeling guilty usually and what we're looking for here is When we do resolve this issue Decisiveness is what we're going to experience much much more often We're even a better way to put it is a lack of indecision We won't be pulled apart like this anymore. This is what it looks like when we heal procrastination I'm a lot more peaceful because the mind is in a war with itself and will be in what they call it in that state of flow We're just gradually quite happily getting things done So we're talking about ending in decision Becoming more decisive ending that battle with it Now, you know If you listen to that voices as you don't have to do it or I don't want to do it You know what? That's fine Also, if you listen to that voice that said you have to do it That would be fine. You go and do it. The problem is there's this competition. There's this conflict So we're in agreement. I hope at this point that the problem itself is not necessarily either voice It's not even have to which I mentioned and Daniel mentioned that I was talking about getting rid of it It's more that there's a conflict with it. Okay, so we're trying to end this conflict within now This technique just dive into the technique here It's going to be it's I'm going to call this technique the agree and amplify technique now The reason I developed this technique was for people in Daniel's situation Who you know, there's one way you can get rid of that have to voice which is to inquire into it You can challenge it and you can realize because the truth is you don't have to do anything There's always a choice and you deserve choice for every right You deserve praise for every positive choice that you make But when we're so ingrained in this have to and this have to is so strong This this technique is a stepping stone that will get you on the way. Okay. Now what it involves like is is this? Let me show you typical Experience what someone who is procrastinating and they have to do these two competing voices in their mind, right two different drives or motives and You know, this was my experience for many many years So you're sitting there and you know, maybe it's 6 p.m. in the evening and You're thinking about okay. Well, look, I have a lot of things to do What am I going to do with my time? So you set an attention for maybe 6 30. I Have to start soon. I have to start at 6 30 because this have to voice is so strong, right? And there's all that anxiety there now What happens? 6 30 eventually rolls around and I find myself Still sitting there. Maybe I'm watching TV or playing video games or something I'm not taking action Now believe it or not at this point, there's no problem Although you may be looking at that thinking that's not good. I'll explain why it's not a problem so far It's the next thing we do in this sequence here. That's the problem so far There has been no problem believe it or not and you'll understand why in a few minutes It's the next thing we're about to do here in this scenario. That is the problem What we do is we fail to show up at 6 30. I have to do it. I have to do it Fail to do it and then I look forward to the rest of my evening I'll say well look 8 p.m. What do I tell myself? I have to do it I'm telling myself the exact same thing again What happens at 8 o'clock? I don't do it Now this is procrastination at this point, right? Telling myself I have to I have to have to and actually not having to not doing it, right? So this is the scenario That's the behavior. We want to eliminate Okay Now I'm not going to tell you you need to push yourself. You're not you're lazy You're any of those things because none of that stuff works. Believe me What we need to do is to agree The problem that the reason this has been happening here constantly putting it off constantly putting it off Is that I I'm telling myself I have to but I don't fully agree with it I haven't made a decision to okay. I have to It's almost like we're agreeing with the inner critic And we're going to call it out. In fact, we're going to out critic the inner critic here with this technique Now, so this is what the technique looks like the next step here Same scenario. You're sitting there at 6 p.m. You're looking out into your evening Time ahead. You're going to set an attention for 6 30 And this time now we're going to agree with the inner critic That's telling us I have to do it. I have to do it and now we're going to say to ourselves Okay, I actually have to do it Now you might be thinking yourself. Oh, well big deal, right? That's not so great so far. What's all this big technique about? Okay, so I actually have to do it is what I'm telling myself now 6 30 comes and I don't do it Again at this point if you remember back I said nothing has gone wrong at this point It's what we do from this point forward in our evening that makes all the difference in this technique So 6 30, I haven't taken action now We look ahead. What's my next step? Am I going to continually push out start times and disrespect the boundary I have with work? This is the technique The inner dialogue becomes much more like rather than I have to do it. I have to do it and maintain that That folds have to which I don't really believe we're going to really agree with it here I'm going to say I had to And I didn't do it Okay, then I guess it won't be done today at all in other words what you're saying to yourself is Okay, this have to voice Was threatening me and it was showing me all these consequences. Okay I believe in have to I fully believe in have to let me have the consequence Show me the consequence. That's it. I didn't do it Therefore it's not done Where's the where's the consequence? Give me the consequence right now What we're doing is We're we're basically saying have to wins Okay, you win now show me the consequence But what you do not do is say, oh, I have to do it. I have to do it Like if it's really something you have to do It either gets done Or it doesn't Right It it will be something that happens now what you're seeing here is well, it didn't happen. I didn't do it Therefore, okay, let me have the consequence now the big fear for procrastinators anyone who's having procrastination is that they won't get the work done That becomes the consequence that we that we bring in here. Okay What I'm saying here is if you keep doing this approach, right and train your nervous system train that inner Inner critic voice right to say well, okay, I agree. Let's go ahead I have to do it at this time and if I don't do it at this time. Well, that means clearly It's not going to get done now because you were telling me I have to do it at that point You step away from it. You no longer make promises yourself. You no longer allow yourself to do it for the rest of that day We're we're out inner critic in the inner critic. We're out have to win the have to voice We're basically agreeing and amplifying Now all the threats that it puts over you, right? All those horrible scenarios that are going to you're going to fail. You're not going to be good enough Okay, let me experience it right now And what you'll see is all those threats are bravado. There's nothing behind them. You can relax And you can literally relax you go and relax you step away from that project and the next day you go back And you say it yourself. Okay. Well look I have to Set a time If you show up, yeah, I did show up because I had to If you don't show up you say, okay I didn't do it Let me see the consequence for this And the consequence should be that you step away from it Right, you're training yourself to take yourself seriously and it only takes a couple of days in my experience Right three days into this technique You may not have done anything on this project if you're in a chronic state of procrastination Much like I was in many of the people I've spoken with But after maybe two or three days You're the inner critic realizes actually I'm not in control here at all There's a decision maker here that is calling the shots and they need to be respected Not bullied or intimidated Right, that's you your personality Your personality is perfectly capable of doing this without any of this bullying or threatening stuff going on So call it out. Call out that half-de-voice Daniel, right or anyone else who's watching this Eventually what this technique will show you is that actually I don't have to do anything I only ever do things because I make choices to do them. There's always a choice Now I can either to choose to choose to do it or not do it I'll I'll live with the consequences of not doing it. I'll be happy to have them But I'll also live with the I also have to take responsibility for when things go well For myself. I deserve the credit for that not some Weird rule that about having to do things when it's not even true Okay, so I know it's a strange technique But I can promise you one thing if you can do that for a few days do it as an experiment You will find that this issue goes away Okay, now there are other things and I you know I talk about those other things in my book You can check out the book. It's on my website. The link for it is is below Some other main things to keep in mind here with this and I'm really trying to get these ideas out there because I I have seen now with clients that they respond to it well And it is just getting rid of that guilt and getting rid of that shame and indecision and that psychological energy that has been wasted in all this People who are using this this technique and the other techniques in the book Are beginning to enjoy themselves more in their free time Which is allotted consciously planned Fun time relaxation time And they're getting a lot more done and it's just peaceful and easy. There's no real willpower or discipline or being strict with yourself with it It's just natural Okay, and your your confidence starts to build I personally I don't care that much about your personal productivity. I couldn't care less if you make you know a million dollars or euros or Or not, right What I care about is developing yourself esteem And that's what this technique will show you how to do Guys thanks again for watching today, and I'll see you in the next video