Two weeks ago, I did a post on how to stop procrastinating. Today’s post looks at one of the biggest obstacles with respect to procrastination–the status quo. 

If you’re like most people, you have at least one or two areas where you have been putting off taking action. Your awareness of the issue is high, a clear path of action exists, and yet you can’t bring yourself to do anything about it.  Take a moment to write down one situation where you are clearly aware of the necessity for taking action yet you are caught in limbo between keeping the status quo and taking the action to change it.

Before figuring out how to move out of this state of limbo, let’s look at the consequences of maintaining the status quo. In the physical world, energy is required to maintain a stable or balanced state. Just as your body requires energy to maintain an even temperature of 98.6 degrees, maintaining the status quo also uses energy. Maintaining the status quo when a change is needed, however, actually requires additional energy over time. The longer you’re stuck in “limbo,” the harder it is to escape into action. For example, the longer you go without exercising, the harder it becomes to start exercising again. The converse is also true – the more that you exercise, the easier it is to continue exercising. Thus, the longer you have been doing something, the more momentum or inertia you have to keep doing the same behavior.

How can you change the status quo? Begin by taking a small, simple action step. You probably know the old joke about “How do you eat an elephant?” (One bite at a time!) The key is to take a tiny bite and to keep biting. In other words, if you want to start exercising at least four times per week, begin by increasing your physical activity 10 minutes today. Tomorrow, you might do another 10 minutes or perhaps 15 minutes. If you miss a day, that’s OK. Just plan on taking another bite tomorrow.

If you’re tackling an elephant, have fun working on it. For example, one woman had been working in the UK for the last 3 years and had placed all of her things in storage. She literally had hundreds of boxes to go through before she moved into her new home back in the US. What she decided to do was to make the tedious task into a treasure hunt. In each box, she was searching for the one treasure she would take to her new home. Everything else she would discard since she didn’t have the space to ship it.

A third approach to changing the status quo is to alter your environment. If you’re tired of telemarketing calls during dinner, disconnect your phone before you sit down to eat. If you find yourself hitting the vending machines at work around 4:00 PM, take an apple or some other healthy snack and place it in your desk so it will be there when you get hungry. If you’re intimidated about speaking to your boss in her office, ask to have the conversation in a less threatening environment.

A fourth approach is to partner up. Parents Without Partners, Weight Watchers, and a host of other organizations assist people facing major life challenges by providing a supportive relationship where positive action is acknowledged and reinforced. In fact, one of the very best ways to partner up is by hiring a coach.

Whether you tackle the elephant alone or with the help of someone else, breaking the cycle of inaction will increase your energy as well as your self-confidence. Remember–just a bite at a time!

Posted by Bernice Ross, CEO, RealEstateCoach.com and author of the #1 best selling book at NAR 2008, Real Estate Dough(TM), Your Recipe for Real Estate Success