I really struggle with procrastination, but a while back I learned this hack. Call it the "do nothing" strategy. It sounds counterproductive but is surprisingly effective.

If there's something you have to do but you keep putting it off, your mind will seek distractions. You might browse the web or flop down on your bed with your phone or even start cleaning your room.

But instead of distracting yourself, do nothing. Tell yourself, okay, I don't have to do the task, but I also can't do anything else. I'll just sit here (not sleep, just sit here).

Your mind will beg you to distract it with something, but if you just sit, pretty soon you'll start thinking about the task and how to tackle it, or how it's not actually that daunting, or how you really just want to get it over with.

And then it's much easier to get to work.

We often think of procrastination or laziness as doing nothing, but really it's distracting oneself with things other than productivity. Our minds hate to do nothing, they want to be stimulated, and the most stimulating thing is jumping from distraction to distraction (i.e. a social media feed), dwelling on nothing.

So the next time you're tempted to flop down on your bed, phone in hand, when you know you have something you should be doing and would feel really good if it were done, try doing nothing.

Bet you can't last two minutes doing nothing.

(Your eyes will also thank you for not jumping between computer screen and phone screen all day long.)