Procrastinators Anonymous

Please note changes to format that we approved by "group conscience" vote at prior business meetings.

I haven't had chance to add these changes yet -- at some point, they will be typed in.

1) add serenity prayer to beginning

2) we do paste in the "Signs" - at the point where format says "skip signs". Especially important if there are newcomers.

3) keep announcements streamlined - when announcing updates about other meetings.  Please state:
"for more info, ask at end of meeting."

4) shares to be 3 minutes per person, with one person volunteeting to be the timekeeper.  People can share a second time if needed.

5) if you are a member who is having trouble typing, or new to the internet, or difficulty formulating thoughts in English language,... please let the leader know so that you can be alloted extra time.

6) please say "done" when you are done sharing.  If there is a  long
pause. the leader is to move on to the next sharer, as we will assume
you have lost internet connection.  You may share a bit more later if
there is time.

7) goals for all of the above: Trying to make the meeting last one hour from start to finish.
Note: Can vote to extend meeting so that everyone has turn to share, but hopefully these changes will reduce need for that.

this reply attempts to provide a one-stop shopping place to cut-n-paste from.

Hint: triple-click selects the whole line (on most computer systems).

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Welcome to the online meeting of Procrastinators Anonymous.

This is a closed meeting, which means that it's open only to those who acknowledge that they are compulsive procrastinators or suspect they might be.

My name is ______________________ and I'm a procrastinator.

I'll be chairing the meeting today.

Would someone please paste the Preamble?

Procrastinators Anonymous is a fellowship of men and women who share their experience, strength and hope with each other that they may solve their common problem and help others to recover from compulsive procrastination.

The only requirement for membership is a desire to stop procrastinating.

There are no dues or fees for P.A. membership; we are self-supporting through our own contributions.

P.A. is not allied with any sect, denomination, politics, organization or institution; does not wish to engage in any controversy, neither endorses nor opposes any causes.

Our primary purpose is to stop procrastinating and help other procrastinators to achieve this goal.

Would someone please paste the Steps?

1. We admitted we were powerless over compulsive procrastination, that our lives had become unmanageable.

2. Came to believe that a power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity.

3. Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we understood God.

4. Made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves.

5. Admitted to God, to ourselves and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs.

6. Were entirely ready to have God remove all these defects of character.

7. Humbly asked God to remove our shortcomings.

8. Made a list of all persons we had harmed, and became willing to make amends to them all.

9. Made direct amends to such people wherever possible, except when to do so would injure them or others.

10. Continued to take personal inventory and when we were wrong promptly admitted it.

11. Sought through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact with God, as we understood God, praying only for knowledge of God's will for us and the power to carry that out.

12. Having had a spiritual awakening as the result of these steps, we tried to carry this message to compulsive procrastinators, and to practice these principles in all our affairs.

Would someone please paste the Tradition corresponding to this month?

1. Our common welfare should come first; personal recovery depends upon P.A. unity.

2. For our group purpose, there is but one ultimate authority - a loving God as may be expressed in our group conscience. Our leaders are but trusted servants; they do not govern.

3. The only requirement for P.A. membership is a desire to stop procrastinating.

4. Each group should be autonomous except in matters affecting other groups of P.A. as a whole.

5. Each group has but one primary purpose - to carry its message to the compulsive procrastinator who still suffers.

6. A P.A. group ought never endorse, finance or lend the P.A. name to any related facility or outside enterprise, lest problems of money, property and prestige divert us from our primary purpose.

7. Every P.A. group ought to be fully self-supporting, declining outside contributions.

8. Procrastinators Anonymous should remain forever nonprofessional, but our service centers may employ special workers.

9. P.A., as such, ought never be organized; but we may create service boards or committees directly responsible to those they serve.

10. Procrastinators Anonymous has no opinion on outside issues; hence the P.A. name ought never be drawn into public controversy.

11. Our public relations policy is based on attraction rather than promotion; we need always maintain personal anonymity at the level of press, radio, films, television, and internet.

12. Anonymity is the spiritual foundation of all our traditions, ever reminding us to place principles before personalities.

(we skip the Signs to save time)

Would someone please paste the names of the Tools?

1. Break It Down, 2. Visualization, 3. Ask Yourself Why

4. Focus on Long-Term Consequences, 5. Avoid Time Binging, 6. Use Small Blocks of Time.

7. Avoid Perfectionism, 8. Keep a Time Log, 9. Develop Routines, 10. Bookend Tasks and Time.

Would someone like to suggest a tool to explore today?

(paste that tool fully)

1. Break It Down: Break down projects into specific action steps; include preparation tasks in the breakdown.

2. Visualization: Plan what to do, then imagine yourself doing it. The more specific and vivid your visualization, the better. See yourself doing the task, and doing it well.

4. Ask Yourself Why: While you are visualizing doing the task, see if you can detect what it is about the task that feels odious to you, what uncomfortable feeling you are avoiding. Knowing what's behind the avoidance can help you get past it - for example, address real problems or ignore irrational fears.

4. Focus on Long-Term Consequences: Procrastinators have a tendency to focus on short-term pleasure, and shut out awareness of long-term consequences. Remind yourself how panicked and awful you'll feel if the task isn't done, then imagine how good it will feel when the task is finished.

5. Avoid Time Bingeing: One reason procrastinators dread starting is that once they start they don't let themselves stop. Plan to work on a task for a defined period of time, then set a timer. When the timer goes off, you're done.

6. Use Small Blocks of Time: Procrastinators often have trouble doing tasks in incremental steps, and wait for big blocks of time that never come. When you have small blocks of time, use them to work on the task at hand.

7. Avoid Perfectionism: Procrastinators have a tendency to spend more time on a task than it warrants, so tasks that should be quick to do take an agonizingly long time. Notice this tendency and stop yourself. Some things require completion, not perfection.

8. Keep a Time Log: Increase your awareness of time by logging what you are doing throughout the day. This is a great diagnostic tool for discovering where your time went, and an excellent way to become better at estimating how long tasks take.

9. Develop Routines: To help structure your day and make a habit of things you always need to do, develop routines for what you do when you wake up, regular tasks of your workday, and what you need to do before going to bed.

10. Bookend Tasks and Time: Check in throughout the day, or at the beginning or end of specific tasks you are dreading. To do this, you can use the Daily Check-ins board on the P.A. Web site. There is also a Special Projects and Master Lists Forum (http://procrastinators-anonymous.org/forum/38). Details on Daily and Special Projects are at the top of the Daily Check-ins board (http://procrastinators-anonymous.org/forum/6). Or use this site's chat. Or you can phone/email a 12-step buddy.

If you are a newcomer or a visitor from another meeting, please let us know so we can welcome you.

Our 7th tradition reminds us that we are self-supporting through our own contributions.

Online meetings: If you haven't yet made a contribution to the PA Web this year, please click the "Contribute" button on the home page.

If you contributed more than a year ago, please remember that the Web site expenses are on-going.

You can also contribute by sharing your recovery story with us, welcoming newcomers and helping them find their way around, reading books and articles about procrastination, or time / task management systems and posting reviews.

Does anyone have any PA announcements?

Business meetings are held on the last week of each month, following the recovery meeting.

You must be present at the business meeting to propose an issue for discussion.

This is a one hour discussion meeting.

We'll choose a topic related to procrastination, or just discuss procrastination in general, and then share on that topic until 5 minutes before the end of the meeting.

Before we open the meeting for sharing, a word about crosstalk guidelines, which help keep our meeting safe.

Crosstalk means giving unsolicited feedback or advice, answering, making "you" and "we" statements, interrogating, debating, criticizing, controlling, or dominating.

In our meetings we speak about our own experience, and we listen without comment to what others share.

We work toward taking responsibility in our own lives, rather than giving advice to others.

Please limit your sharing to that everyone has a chance to share.

To request to share, type *

The moderator will recognize you with "go ahead" or "ga" or something similar.

When finished sharing, type "done" so we know.

Would anyone like to suggest a topic for discussion?

[[...discussion time...]]

In closing, we would like to remind you that the opinions expressed here were strictly those of the individual who gave them.

Take what you like and leave the rest.

If we are to recover, we must feel free to say what is in our minds and hearts, so please remember to respect anonymity.

Let whom you see here and what was said here stay here when you leave here. (Herestay!)

Let's close with a moment of silence, followed by the Serenity Prayer.

God, grant me
the serenity to accept the things I cannot change,
the courage to change the things I can,
and the wisdom to know the difference.

if you would like to chat after the meeting, type: /join post-meeting

Will someone volunteer to stay behind and type lines into the chat to clear the scroll history, to protect all our anonymity.