I consider myself to be a chronic procrastinator. Left to my own devices I make “to do” lists, lists of “to do” lists, project plans, plans for project plans, lists of plans for plans of project plans; essentially, I’ll do anything but actually start working. I willfully make my life more difficult than it need be.

If I’d been a waiter in a 1920′s restaurant in Vienna I’m pretty sure I’d have been fired for going on about how there’ll be all sorts of amazing things in the future, but I might also have been observed by a student by the name of Bluma Zeigarnik.

Zeigarnik noticed that the waiters could remember perfectly the orders of their customers until they’d paid their bill, at which point the waiters instantly forgot all about the order. This effect, now known as the “Zeigarnik Effect”, states that we retain information about unfinished tasks far better than we do about completed ones. Further to that though, the paper in which Zeigarnik first wrote about the effect goes on to explain that our brain actively dislikes having unfinished tasks. The response to working on something that drives us to complete the task is all wrapped up in this effect – we try to clear our minds by finishing things so that we can forget about them.

But how does the Zeigarnik Effect apply to my inability to work properly? It’s quite straightforward. According to Professor Richard Wiseman in his book “59 Seconds”, the best way to overcome procrastination is to start a task. That sounds obvious. He goes further though – you don’t need to think that you’re going to sit down and complete the task. You don’t need to think you’ve got to work all day. So long as you can spend a few minutes on it that’ll be enough. Once the ball is rolling the Zeigarnik Effect will be enough to keep your mind on whatever you’re working on and pull you through to the other side.

I discovered the solution to the problem of procrastination in my last year of university. I started working on my final year project at the beginning of the first semester only because I had a free weekend when all my housemates were away. When I’d sat down to start I had no intention of working on the project for several months. The weekend would have been enough. But having that unfinished task drove me on to finish. All the while most of my fellow students were putting off starting theirs. Consequently, by the end of the year, I’d finished with plenty of time to spare while the rest of the group were pulling all-nighters to get their projects done. I realised that starting was the important bit. The rest comes naturally.

It was only very recently I discovered the reasoning behind the phenomenon (hence this blog post). I can heartily recommend it though if you’re like me – don’t sit down to work for hours. You won’t do anything productive. Sit down to work for a few minutes. That’s the way to get things finished.