If you are a procrastinator with big dreams, you have big problems. I know you already know this. In fact, I’m sure you’ve spent plenty of time beating yourself up over this.

I understand.

I used to be a procrastinator, BIG time.

And as I went after my dream of being an actor I realized I had better figure this out ASAP or I was going to be very typical – another person going nowhere fast and sinking lower and lower because of it.

So I went to work on it. I did all the research I could do on the subject (this was 30+ years ago so no internet – zip nada).

I soon discovered two very important things. Three actually.

One – you will only rise up to the level you believe you deserve.
Two – those that suffer from it soon become consumed by it
Three – there was a way out.

So I began digging. And I tried everything they suggested. Some of it worked but most of it didn’t. The reason why was I was the problem not the information.

My problem? I lacked personal integrity. In other words, my word to myself was not good and it had not been good for so long that I no longer “believed me.”

The greatest thing that eroded my word to myself was my addiction to nicotine. If any of you suffer from this horrible addiction, you know how brutal it is to say you’re going to quit day after day and never do.

And my nicotine of choice was chewing tobacco (I know, I know – believe me I know). I chewed that horrible disgusting stuff every day for twenty-two years. In fact looking back, I only chewed for the first two years and spent the next twenty trying to quit.

Day after day.
Every day.

And I can not tell you how many times I told myself and the world, “This is it. Today I quit.” And I didn’t. And when I didn’t I sunk deeper into this cesspool of, “My word is not good and if my word is not good how in the hell can I do anything I say I’m going to do?”

And the answer was I wasn’t.

My addiction to nicotine was a MAJOR integrity-sucker from my bank of personal integrity and I KNEW that until it got healed/resolved/transcended I would be going after my dreams with a hand break on – sputtering and weaving but never really GOING where I wanted to go and become who I wanted to be.

I quit twenty years ago and have never gone back(wards) to it.

We don’t have time in this newsletter to share all that I did and all I learned along the way about myself, addictions, and my issues as a procrastinator. In fact that’s not even the point of today’s newsletter.

The point is simply to ask you two questions.

One – what is one “habit” in your life that is holding you back from where you want go and who you want to become next in your life?

Two – what are you going to do about it?

If you know the answers to these and yet have been having trouble moving forward then I suggest really diving deep into solutions for a procrastinator. And since the internet now does exist 🙂 there is SO much information out there on the subject and to make it even easier here’s a link to some good stuff.

And if you don’t know your answers to these two questions then please solve them because as Sanford Meisner often said, “This world needs you.”

It does. It really does – more than ever.

As always, thank you for your time and my very best to you,

Jim