How I Overcame My Life-Long Procrastination

5 min read
Evidence based
Psychiatrist and Sensa consultant dr. Monisha Vasa
By Monisha Vasa, MD Updated on 2024 Jan 23

Therapy and medication left her frustrated and feeling hopeless. 

Lucy, 34, finally discovered the key to overcoming procrastination, being productive, and living a fulfilling life.

Today, she shares her story with us:

One Fall evening, I found myself hanging on for dear life in a mess of my own making.

I just couldn’t seem to stop procrastinating…

To be honest, I’ve been a procrastinator for as far back as I can remember. 

During the first few years of working in sales – things came pretty easily. I was good at what I did, and my company rewarded my performance accordingly.

Eventually, though, I started to notice that I was essentially spinning my wheels. Though I was a good performer, I was no longer the best, and I noticed my peers being rewarded with opportunities that weren’t coming to me.

I knew I needed to have a talk with my boss about what was going on – and their response floored me.

She told me that she had tried for months and months to give me chances to accelerate my career but that I had not responded to any of them.

And when I took the time to look back, I realized that she was right. I was utterly paralyzed with indecision when these avenues for advancement came up, so I simply chose not to decide at all, and worse, this was happening without me even realizing it.

I couldn’t believe it! Where the hell had I been? After all the work I had put in, could I really lose everything and be forced to start from near the bottom somewhere else?

This sent me into a tailspin of self-loathing and self-doubt that nearly ruined my career. Was I really cut out for this? How could I prove to my boss and myself that I really could excel?

So, I put everything I had into my work. 

My performance improved, and I got several congratulations from my colleagues and my boss.

Dropping The Ball

 At the same time, my personal life was starting to unravel.

I was due to be married in just 6 months but, all of a sudden, I realized that I had no energy nor inclination to participate in the preparations.

I began to wonder whether getting married right now was really what I wanted to do, and I started giving my fiancé the cold shoulder, which really hurt him. 

He couldn’t figure out what was going on with me, and he suggested I try therapy to help me “figure myself out,” as he put it.

I had known I was a procrastinator for a long time, but I never dreamed that my habit could manifest itself in this way. I was disrupting my relationship, missing out on, or outright ignoring opportunities at work.

Of course, I procrastinated on my therapy sessions, too, telling myself and my fiancé that I simply didn’t have the time for that.

Discovering The True Obstacle

Well, I had been to several therapy sessions, and we had identified my habit of procrastination as a significant hurdle that was preventing me from achieving what I wanted in life.

But as for getting over it, my therapist suggested time and patience. It would take months, more than likely more than a year, before I would be in a position to overcome my procrastination, and that simply wasn’t good enough. 

So, I began searching for other more applicable solutions to a woman in my position.

Eventually, I stumbled upon a page that began by simply asking me questions designed to delve deeper into the origins of my procrastination habit. As this was something my therapist had never bothered to do, this approach intrigued me.

Finally overcoming my procrastination

With just a short quiz, the psychologists and wellness experts behind the Sensa app created a fully customized plan designed to enable me to overcome my procrastination. The price was right – far below what I had been paying for therapy – so I decided to give it a go.

The first week was dedicated solely to getting to the bottom of what was responsible for my procrastination. Though I wanted to get right to the meat of the matter and flip a switch and be procrastination-free, it was this methodical approach, more than anything else, that was responsible for the success I eventually achieved.

After thoroughly examining the underpinnings of my bad habits, the app set about replacing those habits with a routine in which procrastination wasn’t even really an option.

This didn’t happen overnight; it took another three weeks until I was fully ensconced in my new way of thinking. 

But as things began to change, my would-be fiancée was the first to notice one day when we were meeting over a drink to try to determine whether we had a future together.

“Hey, you don’t have that stressed-out look like you’re trying to juggle 50 things at once,” he remarked.

“Whatever this app has you doing, please, keep it up!”

And so, I did.

I was finally able to reach an equilibrium between my private life and work-life where I could tenaciously pursue my sales goals without going completely overboard and casting aside my personal life and, with it my fiancé, who saw the woman he loved once again.

Did it work?

Looking back on it six months later (after a glorious wedding and honeymoon,) it’s fantastic and, at the same time, appalling that my procrastination took such a toll on every aspect of my life. At this point, I’m simply grateful that I stumbled upon Sensa when I did.

You already know that your procrastination is a problem if you’re here. Don’t let it interfere with your life and your livelihood as I did; I urge you to do something about it now before you find your life spinning out of your control and are powerless to stop it.

Psychiatrist and Sensa consultant dr. Monisha Vasa

Dr. Monisha Vasa is a board-certified psychiatrist and wellness consultant with a thriving private practice in Newport Beach, California. She’s actively engaged in supporting physician mental health at UC Irvine and City of Hope National Cancer Center.