The thing about rushing and procrastination

Hayley Carr International - the Australian Life and Leadership Coach

My name is Hayley Carr and I hate being rushed.

Anywhere. With anything.

I'm innately tuned into it. That feeling of being rushed.

Either by me, or someone else. And because I'm a highly sensitive / tuned-in type of personality, the more aware of it I am, the more sensitive I become.

The thing about this that used to get me wound up in a fuss is, believing in the idea that I needed to go faster.

Taking the pressure of being rushed as a suggestion to go faster, skip things, hurry up, make it happen quicker than your pace, and probably skip some steps along the way to sit with, and identify with, some external influence of pace.

Its' when I rush myself, I end up in a tizzy.

Like when I'm trying to look cool and take off on my scooter from a standstill and there's traffic behind me... and I stall. Many times. To the point where I almost wanna give the "sorry" wave to the traffic behind me while I'm learning to ride the road with other cars.

When I get caught up in a story about how long I'm taking, how awkward I am, how this damn bike must have something wrong with it, or maybe it's me, and maybe I'll be stuck at this intersection forever, or I'll accidentally get halfway out onto the road and stall again... I end up trying to rush myself, forgetting to breathe or just do what I need to do, and remember ing how to act like a human.  

My hospital knockout breakthrough.

Last week, as you may know, if you read my articles on the regular, I popped into the hospital to get knocked out and let the doctor take a look around for something. I was a little nervous about the procedure, I don't like hospitals or the idea of getting put to sleep for a bit, and I have lots to do to get our place ready before we move interstate in, oh, 3 weeks.

Everything's fine just so you know - but I noticed something really cool - before I went in, I felt quite tight in my body. But afterward, oh my gosh, I haven't been that relaxed in a while! Aside from the occasional zero-reaction-time spilling of a drink all over me, I was totally just floppy and relaxed, and all I could really do was lay on the couch and read a magazine with short articles.

I slipped into a little vortex of bliss for a few days. Deep sleeps, weird dreams, and a floppy body. (Definitely the drugs.)

And upon returning slowly back into things yesterday, I had a breakthrough about something I've been holding out on.

There's been this offering I quietly dropped on the table to my Play Bigger Feel Better tribe in winter last year, that I haven't unleashed yet, because it didn't quite feel 100% clear as to how I was going to make it work in a way that felt absolutely, 100% aligned with what feels totally like a hell yes for me, and totally like a hell yes for who it's for.

I wanted it to fit in with everything else I was offering, and it didn't quite fit, and the whole creation process of this has really sparked some insights in me, that have turned my business on it's head in the past 10 months.

Embrace your pace, and people can't help but watch.

I kept telling myself to stop procrastinating (I don't really know that there is such a thing) and hurry up and launch it. The pressure was building. I'd been dangling the carrot for a long time. I had everything organised, but not quite, and I couldn't bring myself to just go ahead with it.

On the surface, my mind was playing tricks on me. I wondered if it was fear. Deeper down though, I knew.

I had to embrace my pace.

It didn't feel totally clear and aligned just yet.

And then, when you think you've surrendered, you just surrender some more (or perhaps get knocked out with anaesthetic and have some forced further surrender - I don't recommend trying that at home kids) the idea drops in. Boom.  

And when it does, when everything aligns, when you've finished cleaning out your wardrobe - metaphorically or physically - which you may also call procrastination...

Everything is in order, you've let it go, re-arranged the furniture of your cells... nothing is stopping you.

The thing about procrastination is, there is not a thing about it.

You have to embrace your pace.

If you're telling yourself you need to hurry up, but it's not totally aligned, anyone with a values-based head on their shoulders is going to do whatever it takes to get themselves ready so it happens on THEIR timing - not someone else's.

I spent most of my university years cleaning out my wardrobe, re-arranging furniture and doing anything but the actual work that needed to be done, until I was good and ready to do it.

I told myself this story for so long that I was a horrible procrastinator, and maybe I wasn't good enough to be doing what I was doing. Even though I could stay up late the night before the thing was due and pump it out and get high marks.

I still got my degree.

It's the same piece of paper all the "organised" people received.

I told myself for so so so long that I wasn't good enough, for so many things, because I wasn't jumping right into it when everyone else was, or in the same way.

I know now, I was going at my own pace and finding my own rhythm.

If I didn't discover how to do that, I wouldn't be here. Talking to you.

There are consequences to NOT embracing your rhythm, and the amount of times you need to ask questions, and faff, and clear the decks before you start.

You end up not questioning, and never really exploring.

You turn your dials down. All of them.

You end up losing your spark

You fall prey to the drift of everyone around you, and what they fear, and what they think is real

You fall prey to societal pressure and peer expectation.

You never get to know who you really are, what you like, what you don't like.

You never get to know what you need to feel comfortable, and safe, and ready, and

You never get to know how you best like to learn and express yourself.

These are key to living deeply.

Instead of feeling like you need to match the pace of the world around you - even when there are deadlines, I invite you to do this instead:

Take a deep breath - or ten.

Remember that time was made up.

Ask yourself what you need to do right now to feel massive joy, release, and an increase in energy,

Go do it.

Then ask again.

You'll end up coming back to the thing you ultimately know is meant for you.

Sure it may mean quitting a degree you never really wanted to do in the first place... that'd be ok, wouldn't it?

It might mean you go and watch Netflix for a few hours with some chocolate... you're welcome.

But then, guess what?

You'd get bored of doing those things and come back to your purpose.

Doing what you FEEL like doing would look like doing what's ultimately going to get you closer to your desires - and that might be finishing your tax or that essay.  

Things get done faster when you do them from a position of choice.