Procrastination and Creativity

Celebrate Procrastination and Increase Your Creativity

Procrastination has perks that you can use to increase your creativity in any area.

Procrastination is something that we all do. Whether it’s a school paper, a work deadline, starting a new workout routine, dealing with a difficult problem with a friend, or just getting up in the morning, we’ve all experienced putting off those things that we’d rather not do.

We know procrastination can limit productivity and make us miss deadlines. But as far as the creative process is concerned, procrastination can lead to better and more unique ideas.

Active vs. Passive Procrastination

In order to understand the relationship between procrastination and creativity, we need to understand the difference between active and passive procrastination. Passive procrastinators are paralyzed by their inability to make decisions that initiate action. These individuals fail to complete tasks on time or at all.

Passive procrastination may be the result of poor time management skills or the tendency to underestimate the time it takes to complete something. Passive procrastinators often use repression or avoidance as coping strategies. That sublimates any anxiety that might otherwise prompt them to act.

In contrast, active procrastinators are deliberate procrastinators. These individuals prefer to work under pressure. They are fully aware of how long it takes them to complete a task and accurately predict when they need to begin in order to finish on time.

Also called deliberate delays, active procrastination is considered to be a positive form of procrastination. Active procrastinators experience lower stress levels and task dropout as they don’t purposely block or suppress thoughts about the task and how best to carry it out.

Some people have a natural preference for using deliberate delays. These individuals know that they complete tasks best and are most creative when they are pressured by having a limited amount of time to complete it.

I’ve always been one of these people. My mother has always teased me about procrastinating, calling me Scarlett O’Hara, who was in the habit of thinking about things “tomorrow”. But when I tried to do something in well in advance, I would get off track, over explain things, and produce a paper that was far too long and convoluted, losing sight of what I was trying to say.

When I only had a limited amount of time and felt the pressure to get it done quickly, I focused on what I had to do and did it in a manner that was clear and concise. So I made a practice of just focusing on what I had to write or learn for a test the next day and didn’t try to complete it any further ahead of time.

“I’ll think of it tomorrow. I can stand it then. . . After all, tomorrow is another day.”

— Scarlett O’Hara, Gone With the Wind

Creativity and Enjoyment

One thing that enhances our ability to be creative is a sense of joy in what we are doing or planning to do in the future. When we feel like we are burnt out or doubt whether we can carry out a task, it can inhibit our ability to complete it.

When we enjoy what we’re doing instead of dreading or going through the motions, we do more than we have to do to fulfill our obligation.

Doing the bare minimum restricts our creativity as we won’t seek out new solutions to the problem or try to combine information or techniques we’ve used before in new ways to create a novel outcome.

In the book Flow: The Psychology of Happiness (2013), Mihaly Csikszentmihaly states that we experience enjoyment at the boundary between boredom and anxiety.

When task demands result in an optimal level of anxiety, or just the right amount to make us act, it can increase our willingness and desire to complete a task.

Purposely delaying something so that there is a time pressure can help us find that line between bored indifference and overpowering anxiety, resulting in a sense of joy, empowerment and accomplishment leading to more creative results.

Positive Procrastination and Creativity

Research has shown that deliberate delays are positively linked to creativity. In one study conducted by Shin (2015), participants were asked to generate new business proposals.

Those in one group were told to start working right away while those in the other group were told they would have five minutes to play a video game first.

Those in the control group were told to play a game for five minutes and only then were asked to come up with a business idea.

Results showed those who had procrastinated came up with ideas rated as 28 percent more creative compared with those who started right away.

When people played games before being told about the task of generating business ideas, no increase in creativity was found.

Only when first learning about the task then putting it off were they able to generate more novel ideas. It was concluded that procrastination encouraged divergent thinking.

Another study suggests that the relationship between active procrastination and creativity may not be a direct one. In this study, it was found that deliberate delays were related to creative ideation through a sense of creative self efficacy.

In other words, when we feel challenged creatively, active procrastination in the presence of the belief that we can produce new results leads to our ability to generate, develop and communicate new ideas (Liu, Pan, Luo, Wang, & Pang, 2017).

Strategies for Using Purposeful Procrastination to Enhance Your Creativity

Active procrastination can be used by almost everyone to increase creativity. For those who find that procrastination has not helped them in the past, there are some strategies you use to increase its effectiveness.

The main thing underlying these techniques is that you have to make a deliberate decision to delay the work you need to do, and you need to believe in your own creativity, that it’s a part of you and not just a fluke that has happened once in a while. Once both of these things are in place, the strategies below can encourage your creative process.

1. Focus on time pressure as an opportunity for growth and a challenge to overcome, as opposed to stress. By changing your thinking about deadlines, your brain perceives two types of motivation that can lead to creativity. The first is internal motivation or the desire to overcome the challenge and experience personal growth as a result. The second kind is external motivation or the desire to complete the task on time to create a positive reputation for being responsible and fulfilling your commitments,. and thereby establishing personal credibility.
2. Consider the optimal level of anxiety that you need to trigger your motivation to get something done. This may take some exploration and experimentation. Don’t worry if the first few times you try to use positive procrastination you aren’t successful. We use anxiety unconsciously and so may not be aware of exactly where the line is between what pushes us to act and what paralyzes us and prevents us from acting. That’s why the first few times you try these strategies, it’s best not to use them when you have something important you need to accomplish.
3. If you don’t have natural deadlines in place, set your own deadlines. Determine how much time you need to realistically complete a post or another task.
4. Some people don’t respond well to arbitrarily set deadlines since they aren’t seen as having any real consequences. It can help if you get a friend or writing partner involved for accountability. Have them check in with you at the time you have set to begin your post or other task. Let them know when you complete the task. Just knowing that someone is expecting us to do something by a certain time can increase the challenge of an activity motivating us to complete it. If all else fails, set a certain amount of money as a consequence should you not complete the task on time. The amount should be enough that you don’t want to lose it without being prohibitive.
5. Using what you learned about your tolerance for anxiety and the ideal amount that is the most motivating for you, actively procrastinate by doing something else that is constructive until the time you have set to begin working. Don’t let your inner critic dissuade you from attaining your goal by throwing self doubt and criticism at you. You know what you can do and have set your deadline based on your own self-knowledge of what you are capable of.
6. If you are still having trouble using active procrastination, try establishing natural deadlines by identifying calls for submissions online with hard deadlines that you can complete. Find a call that has a deadline that provides just enough time for you to finish your submission. Complete your response and submit it. Successfully completing this type of task can provide a positive boost to our mood and sense of accomplishment, enabling us to feel greater motivation to complete other projects. It can also help us learn what it feels like to complete a project while experiencing a heightened sense of challenge that is motivating but not crippling.
7. When using active procrastination, it’s okay to think about the project or to plan some aspects involved in carrying it out while you are purposely delaying. Just make sure that don’t feel pressured to do so and that any thoughts or plans naturally come to mind.

Takeaway

Procrastination is something we all work to decrease. Yet active procrastination can actually be a positive factor enhancing our creativity.

While positive procrastination can limit our ability to be prolific, more is not always better. You can produce five articles a day and be very productive, but these articles may be unoriginal and lacking in appeal for readers.

It might be better to produce one article a day or every other day. Use purposeful delays in order to produce more interesting and unique articles.

Delaying a task on purpose can be an effective strategy for increasing creativity without affecting the ability to complete a task on time. You can set an arbitrary deadline. This is especially effective for those who work well under pressure.

Procrastination can give you time to come up with divergent ideas, to think in nonlinear ways that are different from the way you normally think.

It can also help you make unexpected leaps in terms of combining information or strategies in ways that wouldn’t otherwise be obvious.

References

Liu, W., Pan, Y., Luo, X., Wang, L., & Pang, W. (2017). Active procrastination and creative ideation: The mediating role of creative self-efficacy. Personality and Individual Differences, 119, 227–229.

Shin, J. (2015). Putting Work Off Pays Off: The Hidden Benefits of Procrastination for Creativity. manuscrito en proceso de revisión.

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