How Moving My Desk Out of My Bedroom Helped Me Stop Procrastinating
A small change can lead to a big shift in what you do
Seeing how people work to achieve many productive things makes me very jealous. How can they seem to have endless energy to accomplish so much?
Meanwhile, I didn't have much energy and got tired easily. This ended up causing me to procrastinate rather than actually doing things.
However, over time, I realized one thing that has a stronger influence on reaching peak productivity than motivation that is the environment.
The environment often matters more than motivation
In the past, my study desk was always placed next to my bed. Not only that, it was always cluttered with things related to memories, motivational items, or a crowded dream board — which I thought its aesthetics would inspire me.
But now, I’ve changed its placement, creating a new workspace and create a new routine there.
I moved the study desk out of the bedroom and cleared everything off it.
This move wasn’t without reason. In fact, many of the actions we take daily are not driven by purposeful drive and choice but by the most obvious familiar option.
So creating a ‘workspace’ for oneself outside the area usually associated with relaxation and ease can help trigger the creation of new productivity.
Redesign your environment
In the long run, we actually become a product of the environment we live in.
Thus, I arranged my environment anew to create a setting that triggers a subtle cue for just one activity: work.
It’s an effort to make productive cues obvious and devoid of unproductive ones.
It’s as simple as not mixing activities in one place, such as avoiding doing anything on the bed except using it solely for rest and relaxation, as scientists have shown that this can reduce insomnia.
At the end, the environment is the invisible hand that shapes human behavior.
