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When we procrastinate, we think we’re putting something off until later.
Until later comes—and we still don’t do it.
That’s because if something isn’t important enough to do now, our mind often downgrades its importance altogether. The longer we delay, the easier it becomes to keep pushing it off. But until when?
We actually use this to our advantage when we delay gratification: we lower the urgency of impulse wants until the impulse fades entirely. But the same mechanism works against us when we avoid a task, decision, or project. We’re not just pausing—we’re quietly and increasingly de-prioritizing something that may be deeply important.
This kind of avoidance can feel good in the moment, but it rarely serves our highest goals and values.
Because most of the time, we’re not mindfully scheduling for the “right time.” We’re simply avoiding some kind of discomfort—mental, emotional, logistical.
We don’t want to decide which kind of IRA to open.
We don’t want to slog through the paperwork to get life insurance.
We don’t really want to know how much we spend on takeout each month.
But here’s the tricky part. Procrastination feels like non-action, just a harmless short-term reprieve… when it’s really a form of action.
It’s a choice. And it has consequences.
By delaying that IRA, we’re choosing to miss out on another day, month, or year of compounding returns.
By avoiding life insurance, we’re choosing to leave our family’s security vulnerable and roll the dice another month or year.
By not looking at our spending data, we’re choosing to stay in the dark—and likely continue patterns we’d change if we saw them clearly.
Are those choices you would consciously make? Probably not.
But that’s the insidious nature of procrastination. We trade short-term discomfort (a tough decision, tedious paperwork, emotional friction) for long-term risk.
And not just risk—we trade momentum. Clarity. Progress. Peace of mind.
It’s much better to shine a light on whatever you’re avoiding. What’s the real obstacle? What’s the discomfort you’re trying not to feel?
Once you name it, you can deal with it. Often it’s not as bad as we’ve made it out to be. And the cost of continuing to avoid it? Much higher than the cost of taking action.
Procrastination always feels like a neutral pause. But in reality, it’s a slow drift away from the life you want to build.
Dissatisfaction and discomfort dominate our brain’s default state, but we can use them to motivate us instead of defeat us.
Nir Eyal in Indistractable
To procrastinate is to be entitled. It is arrogant. It assumes there will be a later. It assumes you’ll have the discipline to get to it later (despite not having the discipline now)… The thing to start with is the hard part, the part you want to do the least.
Ryan Holiday in Discipline is Destiny
I hope you enjoyed this edition of Under 2, an email series designed to share quick bites of wisdom to empower your financial journey (while keeping it short). Be sure to sign-up below to get these messages in your inbox.
All for now,
Lindsey