If you frequently fall victim to procrastination, pay attention to your patterns.       

Do you procrastinate on everything or only on some things? Some people procrastinate primarily on big projects—others tend to avoid the small, boring, or annoying tasks. The worst part about procrastination is how much time we waste wandering on meaningless tasks and doing anything to avoid the dreaded project.           

Combat procrastination with the following tips:  

• Break down overwhelming projects into smaller tasks. Break down large, intimidating tasks into a series of half-hour to one-hour steps. Each day you have some time to work on your project, tackle one step at a time for a sense of true accomplishment.   
• Start in the middle. If it’s hard to get started on a project at the beginning, try jumping to the second or third step to ease into the water. For example, when writing a letter, the opening paragraph may be the most difficult. If you’re stuck, try jumping to the body of the letter, outlining the bullets you want to cover first. Get that out of the way, and the introduction may come easier.           
• Focus on the payoff. By taking your eye off the particular task and focusing on the happiness and success you’ll gain from completion, you can often keep yourself moving forward. For example, when filling out expense forms, think about what you will buy with the reimbursement.             
• Set time limits on difficult tasks. Setting aside either too much time—or not enough time—can make you procrastinate. Setting aside an hour to do expense reports? Minimize the torture by shrinking it down to 30 minutes and get as far as you can. Trying to plan a holiday event in 30 minutes and can’t get started? Try giving   yourself an hour and see if that does the trick.