Laziness Causes and Symptoms That Are Clues To Unlocking Your Productivity
Hey Muses! Welcome back to my channel. If you feel like the absolute laziest lump to ever grace a sofa, this video is for you. I'm going to teach you how to translate your laziness symptoms into powerful personalized hacks to unlock your productivity.
Watch the video below or read on for the full transcript.
If you struggle with chronic and mental illness, and want to go from stuck to unstoppable, subscribe to my channel and hit the bell to be notified when I post a new video every Tuesday.
I help my coaching clients overcome their laziness, procrastination, and resistance all the time. That is really the backbone of my business. But now it's your turn to get some of that good stuff.
Laziness often comes down to one or more of the following:
Avoidance
Low Energy, or
Mental Illness
If poor mental health, low energy, tiredness, and just overall exhaustion are things that you deal with I highly recommend checking out this video next (after you're done watching this one). Because right now we're really gonna focus on avoidance as a cause of laziness.
In order to translate our laziness symptoms into personalized productivity solutions, we have to answer two big questions.
First of all: What are we avoiding with our laziness and why? (Getting as specific as possible is really important here.)
And question two: What accommodations can you make for yourself to improve your situation, instead of just expecting you to fundamentally change who you are (which is never the answer)?
These questions may seem really simple, but let's dive into an example or two so you can see how truly powerful they actually are.
Example number one: I used to avoid working a LOT, not just in my adult life but I also avoided and procrastinated on homework all the time back when I was a student.
Why did I spend the majority of my time on the sofa watching TV or scrolling on my phone?
Why?
It wasn't because I wasn't motivated.
It wasn't because I was lazy.
Because it turns out under the right circumstances I am a productive powerhouse.
The transformation I have seen in myself of the past five years or so boggles my mind. And in this particular example I thought I was avoiding the work, but I wasn't.
It turns out I was avoiding sitting in this chair I'm sitting in right now, working at this desk. It wasn't the work itself, it was the conditions under which I had to work.
I have an invisible disability called Postural Orthostatic Tachycardia Syndrome (POTS) and, long story short, whenever one body part of mine is physically lower than another body part, my blood goes down via gravity because my autonomic nervous system isn't as good at recirculating blood back up to my heart and my head. For this reason I get out of breath just sitting in a chair. (You've probably noticed this from my past videos.) Imagine how bad it is when I teach dance, when I have to be standing and moving around. I get super out of breath really fast and I hate it so much. But that's something else.
At the end of the day, what I was avoiding was the physical labor of doing the work at this desk, in this chair. But what I figured out was, "Oh! I could change the circumstances under which I work!"
It really bothers me that I was never referred to an occupational therapist after my diagnosis. I had to basically become my own occupational therapist.
But now, due to the very generous help of my boyfriend, I have a motorized bed frame and I can work from bed in a reclined position and... It has honestly changed my life. It is miraculous. I have more energy to do other things that are supposed to be physically laborious. It's magical. And I'm really looking forward to seeing how much energy I have to dance once social isolation is over.
But what I needed to figure out was, no... What was I specifically avoiding?
I thought it was work, but what was really going on was I was avoiding the physical circumstances of doing the work - NOT the work itself.
That is a super duper important distinction, because I have the power to control that situation and I can change the circumstances under which I work.
And so by asking, "What am I avoiding and why?" and then "What can I do to change that situation that doesn't ask me to fundamentally change who I am?" I am suddenly no longer nerfed. I can do all of the work that I need to do.
I mean sure, I still have invisible disabilities. I still have to rest a helluva lot more than other people. But now the simple act of editing someone's manuscript, or writing scripts for these videos, or filming episodes of Nerdy West Coast Swing with my dance teaching partner - those are all significantly less taxing now, so I can spend that energy elsewhere in my life and it is INCREDIBLE.
Now that you've heard that story, that example... Based on the laziness symptoms you are currently experiencing, think about what you're avoiding and ask yourself, "Is that ACTUALLY what you're avoiding, or is there something more specific that's a part of that or adjacent to that that is the actual thing that's holding you back?" Comment below and let me know.
Let's move on to another example.
So while my revelation of working from a reclined position in bed with all of the tools I need to make that comfortable and feasible is a very recent thing in my life, I also have made some big shifts in my laziness in other areas of my life before this.
And there's one huge one that I want to share with you today.
I would avoid doing any amount of work - even small, bite-sized, totally doable amounts of work because I didn't feel capable. I didn't feel like I was enough.
But very specifically, I believed I wasn't a hard worker.
This was something that I was raised with a large amount of shame around when I was a child. Just the fact that I didn't work hard enough. And it was a detrimental limiting belief until fairly recently. Like, I didn't budge this thing until last Spring.
And I know what you're saying! Limiting beliefs! If you've spend any amount of time in the self-development space over the last two decades, you are probably so DONE with limiting beliefs. But this one, and the shift I made... Such a DOOZY that I really want to share it with you.
Like I said, I was raised to believe that the only way to be a valuable human being was to be a hard working, to work so hard that you could probably call yourself a martyr in fact.
However, I was one of those incredibly bright, talented, and "promising" children that didn't have to put in a lot of work to get a 4.0 GPA. Like, really. It was really easy for me.
But that meant from the outside it looked like I wasn't doing anything.
But I was still getting good grades!
(If you can relate, type "4.0" in the comments. We shall rally around one another!)
Basically, in their eyes I wasn't nearly a hard enough worker. Like, I fell so short against that measuring stick, and I was deeply shamed for it growing up, and it was awful.
Let's take a look at what kind of laziness symptoms this belief of "I'm not a hard worker" created in my behaviors.
First of all, the false belief that what comes naturally to me: my talents, my passions, any of that stuff... BECAUSE it comes naturally to me, it didn't qualify as hard work. SO for me to put any time and effort into those things didn't qualify as hard work, therefore wasn't valuable, therefore I should be doing other things with my life.
So what was the result?
A whole lot of me doing nothing while on the sofa.
I was just wasting time.
But everything else was just depressing to do and therefore I avoided it for those reasons.
So there I was, on the sofa, avoiding the things I liked because that wouldn't help me become a "worthy" human being, meanwhile over here I was avoiding doing stuff I didn't like but would make me a "worthy" (giant scare quotes) but you know... DEPRESSING. Also hard to do when one is invisibly disabled.
What mindset shift released me from this giant cog-in-a-wheel prison?
Hold on to your brain cells!
YOUR work is valid.
YOUR work qualifies as hard work.
If something brings you fulfillment, it DEFINITELY qualifies as hard work.
Joyful work is hard work.
Fulfilling work is hard work.
Work that comes NATURALLY to you is still hard work.
YOU are a VERY hard worker.
As soon as I spoke these words to myself and really internalized the shift, the truth (because the old belief was based on a complete lie), I suddenly had deep, unconditional self-permission to do MY work.
And from there my laziness decreased and my productivity picked up speed naturally, without me having to put any effort into making it happen.
So if you're avoiding things and being lazy because you have discovered you have a limiting belief, the question you need to ask yourself is this: Where is the lie?
Because I guarantee, if there is a limiting belief holding you back, part of it is most certainly a LIE.
Once you find that lie, the truth will probably be obvious to you, and that truth has the power to set you free.
All right, so we talked about three powerful questions to use to analyze your laziness, so that way you can come up with personalized ways of boosting your productivity. Those three questions were:
One: What am I avoiding and why? (Really dig deep.)
Question two: What accommodations can I make for myself so that way my circumstances change and my laziness decreases naturally, as opposed to asking myself to fundamentally change? (For example, asking myself to fundamentally change would be asking myself to really enjoy sitting here at my desk, feeling the blood drain into my feet, and being completely out of breath. That's never gonna happen.)
And then finally, if you realize that part of what is causing your laziness is a limiting belief, you need to ask yourself, "Where is the lie in that limiting belief?" Because I guarantee you there is at least one if not more housed in that one little limiting belief, and as soon as you dig them up you'll discover the truth, and it'll probably feel so freeing. And you'll discover yourself changing without having to put any effort into it.
If, as you're asking yourself these three questions, you're struggling to find answer, I highly recommend checking out this video on a journaling technique I call "Anytime Pages." you just use those questions as the journaling prompts. So you can check out that video at the link in the description box below.
What I talked about today is really only the tip of the iceberg when it comes to holistic productivity.
What do I mean by holistic productivity? I mean that true, sustainable, consistent productivity relies on taking into account that you are an imperfect human being with needs, with dreams, with feelings. If you approach yourself like a robot, you're gonna burn out (like I talked about last week). So it's really important to take into account everything that's going on in your life to understand why you're behaving quote unquote "lazily," why you're being unproductive, why this, why that...
Most behavior as a human being is subconscious, and it's a result of other things going on. And often you need someone else to help you understand what else is going on, and that is kind of the entire foundation of my coaching business - is helping people go from stuck to unstoppable doers who are consistent with their productivity without overworking themselves, and having a safe space in a community to process tough things. Like really, it's incredible.
But if you want even more information on how to overcome your laziness, overcome your procrastination and resistance, I highly recommend checking out my Masterclass where I teach you three more doozy mindset shifts and a simple three-step process to get you being productive consistently.
This class is the backbone of everything I do and it is 100% free to you. All you have to do to get access is go to this link and sign up.
If you like this video, please hit that like button and subscribe, and share it with your friends.
I'll be back next Tuesday with another video. I'll see you then. Bye.
OUTTAKES:
Yes, I know I look like Christmas. It seemed like a good idea at the time...
[WHINY VOICE: Oh, I was so close!]
[TINY GROAN]
[WHISPERING: I want to go to bed now.]
If you're wondering why my chin is always tipped back when I'm talking into this thing, it's because I have HORRENDOUS dark circles if I do this. I look like death, therefore [SMOULDERY: Ha haaaaaaaaaa]
[ANGRY CARTOONY VOICE: Forgot that one part again!]
[ANGRY CARTOON GROWL]
[PROLONGED GROAN]
No.
[GASP] I did it!