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How to tell when procrastinating is actually anxiety - Quartz
Perhaps you’ve noticed a pattern emerging in your daily or weekly planner. While plenty of projects cycle on and off the to-do list more or less on schedule, a stubborn handful turn over from one day, week, or month to the next without progress—and frustratingly, they are the projects you find most meaningful.
If this sounds familiar, it’s worth taking a closer look at what’s holding you back. As it turns out, a packed to-do list that leaves no time for meaningful work can be a sign that something deeper is going on: anxiety.
Work-related anxiety is a vestigial response, explains psychologist Andrew Rosen, founder and director of the Center for Treatment of Anxiety and Mood Disorders in Delray Beach, Florida. That feeling of panic or agitation when you’re stressed is part of the physical “fight or flight” response humans evolved to respond to threats.
Perhaps you’ve noticed a pattern emerging in your daily or weekly planner. While plenty of projects cycle on and off the to-do list more or less on schedule, a stubborn handful turn over from one day, week, or month to the next without progress—and frustratingly, they are the projects you find most meaningful.
If this sounds familiar, it’s worth taking a closer look at what’s holding you back. As it turns out, a packed to-do list that leaves no time for meaningful work can be a sign that something deeper is going on: anxiety.
Work-related anxiety is a vestigial response, explains psychologist Andrew Rosen, founder and director of the Center for Treatment of Anxiety and Mood Disorders in Delray Beach, Florida. That feeling of panic or agitation when you’re stressed is part of the physical “fight or flight” response humans evolved to respond to threats.