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It is a small swap and it takes two seconds, which is what makes it usable when there is nobody around to prompt you. It shifts you off how the task looks right now, which is mostly dread, and onto how the week looks later, which is where the real cost sits. Answer honestly, then start any piece of it.
Race to do good deeds (Quran 2:148). The good thing is put in front of you as something to move towards now rather than later.
البقرة
وَلِكُلࣲّ وِجۡهَةٌ هُوَ مُوَلِّيهَاۖ فَٱسۡتَبِقُواْ ٱلۡخَيۡرَٰتِۚ أَيۡنَ مَا تَكُونُواْ يَأۡتِ بِكُمُ ٱللَّهُ جَمِيعًاۚ إِنَّ ٱللَّهَ عَلَىٰ كُلِّ شَيۡءࣲ قَدِيرࣱ
Each community has its own direction to which it turns: race to do good deeds and wherever you are, God will bring you together. God has power to do everything
Qur’an 2:148read it in the library
Translation: M.A.S. Abdel Haleem, The Qur'an, Oxford University Press, 2004.
Meta-analysis of behavioural activation, an approach built on scheduling activity whatever your motivation is doing and letting mood follow, found it effective for depression across the trials pooled. It was tested as a treatment for depression rather than as a tip for everyday delaying, so the read across to a Tuesday afternoon is partial.
Ekers, D.; Webster, L.; Van Straten, A.; Cuijpers, P.; Richards, D.; Gilbody, S. (2014). Behavioural Activation for Depression; An Update of Meta-Analysis of Effectiveness and Sub Group Analysis. PLoS ONE doi
BA comparable to full CBT protocols.
Strength of evidence: one line of research. A single study, or a theoretical account.
Acting first is often what changes the feeling, rather than the other way round.
When something does not get written down, go back to that exact moment with curiosity rather than a telling off. What was in your hands, where were you, what did you tell yourself?
The hardest kind of delaying to catch is the useful kind. You clear the inbox, sort the cupboard, answer three messages, and all of it is real work, and none of it is the thing.
Choosing the app, picking the colours, setting up the tags: that is the task avoiding you. It is interesting, it feels like preparation, and by bedtime nothing has been done.