Making a career out of procrastination in Prague

Procrastination isn’t necessarily a trait that’s common in expats. Though of course procrastinating things like Czech lessons or giving up a teaching gig to seek out a higher paying job are always considerations for many us.

Whether either of those situations applies to you or you just want to make some positive life changes, chances are that procrastination may just be holding you back.

“Personally, my life has changed for the better since I moved to Prague. I started in sales and I got promoted as a coach after six months. People here gave me a chance and challenged me to grow. I fell in love with leadership, coaching, and self-development. I love Prague! I’m very grateful for living here. “

We recently spoke with Durand about how to overcome procrastination — according to him, it was one of the most Googled words in France in 2018! — and how it can hinder success on the jobs market in Prague and the Czech Republic or your decisions to finally learn Czech:

Unfortunately, it is. We’re living in an era where we have access to so much knowledge and information. Sounds great and we should all be grateful for that. However, it’s hard to make a decision and set up actions to move forward. That’s the paradox of choice. The more options we have, the fewer decisions we make. We call that the decision paralysis.

Social media never ends. A book or a newspaper does. When we scroll down on our social media, it’s hard to stop. On top of that, the habit of looking for instant gratification and comparing our lives to others increases the time we spend (or I should rather say “lose”) on social media.

Hard to say. Cultures are different, but our brains are the same. The interactions between emotions and rationality in our brains are the same and, unfortunately, we’re all the victims of our cognitive biases. I wish I could tell you that, naturally, Europeans procrastinate less, but I’m not sure it’s an objective statement to make.

We procrastinate because we’re struggling to deal with our emotions. It’s not necessarily a time-management issue. It’s an emotion-management one. Once we feel a feeling, we rationalize it and tell ourselves stories to justify an action.

We believe that procrastination can be overcome by improving these four categories of our lives: motivation, time-management, emotions towards outcomes, and objectivity, developing which can enhance critical thinking and better decision making.

It is maybe because we believe it’ll be harder than what it actually is or it’ll take more time than in reality. Or, maybe because we failed to learn a language in the past and we believe we’re not capable of doing so today or tomorrow. We’re good at telling stories to ourselves!

No, I don’t think so. It depends on the drive we have when we’re living abroad. Personally, my life has changed for the better since I moved to Prague

By defining what we’re looking for and set up an action plan to make it happen. The best advice I can give is to split that project into as many small tasks as possible. Learn how to write a good CV and a good LinkedIn profile, look for the most attractive positions, learn how to send a great job application, and form the habit of doing the right thing, step by step.

Sometimes people misunderstand procrastination and tell me they need to take time to think and be creative. I fully agree with that. Don’t think not procrastinating means you always have to be busy! It means: “doing things we should do to live a fulfilled life.”

Taking time to think, socialize, letting creative ideas grow is essential.