Hack to get started (and against procrastination)

Take a task that you have little or no desire to complete. Perhaps you have been putting it off for a while (because of this). You find it difficult to get started. You think about a period of time or unit of work that doesn't seem too long and decide to only tackle the task for this short period of time. Set yourself a timer if you are working with time as a unit.

For example: tidy the kitchen cupboards and wipe through for 10 minutes or read just one page of a specialist text. The deal is: you can stop after the 10 minutes or the page. As a rule, you will usually realize two things after the time (or unit) has elapsed: First, what you accomplished in the short unit. (“It's not that bad...”). And secondly, you will probably decide to continue. And the latter was the goal.

If you don't feel like continuing: Stop (do something nice that you feel like doing). Then try again, with the same or a smaller unit. Don't worry: even if your brain “knows” that you are trying to trick your unwillingness by setting an artificial deadline, this hack works. The important thing is that you really do stop when in doubt, because that way you will have “completed” what you have defined as your goal. And that was (only) 10 minutes or one page. Incidentally, Serlo calls this technique the 5-minute trick.