I’m Not Procrastinating. I’m Bracing for Impact

I'm dithering. I’m delaying. I'm distracted by shiny things! Not because my work is hard. In fact, the task in front of me is straightforward. I know exactly what I need to do, and I know I’ll do it well. That’s not arrogance; it’s experience. I’ve done this kind of work many times before. I’ve delivered high-quality, thoughtful, rigorous pieces of work to clients and their Boards on countless occasions. And yet here I am, dragging my feet. Not because I don’t know where to start, but because I already know where it ends.

The hardest part of the process (for me) isn’t the work. It’s the reception.

I know that once I submit this piece, it will pass through the hands of people who will see it not as a contribution, but as a target. Some will offer valuable insight, which of course is welcomed. But there are always one or two who will critique from a place of weakness, not strength. They won’t engage with the thinking or the evidence or seek to improve the work. They’ll just chip away at it. Their comments will be vague, performative, or misinformed. They’ll complain that it’s not what they expected, even though they never voiced their expectations. They’ll bemoan the cost of paying me and question my processes, my expertise, and my value. And they’ll do it all with the weight of position, not expertise.

And that’s the part that wears me down.

I procrastinate not because I’m unsure of what to say or how to say it, but because I’m trying to delay the inevitable - the moment when a piece of thoughtful, diligent, good work is treated with casual disdain by someone who neither understands the content nor appreciates the process (or has even sought to understand the process).

Sadly, I know all too well what it feels like to have something I’ve carefully crafted pulled apart by someone who doesn’t understand it but feels compelled to find fault anyway. It’s not intellectually challenging, it’s emotionally draining; and it always feels personal, even when I know it shouldn’t.

This kind of critique is corrosive. Not because it’s intellectually devastating, but because it is exhausting. It is hard to keep showing up with your best work when the environment ensures it will be pulled apart by people who are not equipped to engage with it meaningfully. Worse still, this isn’t robust debate or helpful challenge but often just projection. It is criticism from a place of weakness, not strength. Undermining born of insecurity, not insight.

For those of us who are conscientious, who take pride in doing things well, this dynamic takes a toll. We internalise the negativity. We absorb it. We start to dread not just the work, but the entire cycle: produce, submit, defend, recover. That dread becomes procrastination. Not of the task, but of the pain that comes after.

Procrastination is my defence mechanism and I’m protecting myself from emotional injury.

But I’m learning. I’m learning to name what’s really happening. I’m learning to remind myself that just because someone has a seat at the table doesn’t mean their critique is valid. I know the value of my work, my experience, and my expertise. If someone without relevant experience only wants to deliver shallow critique rather than question me to learn, then I don’t need to give their opinion equal weight. I can listen without internalising. And I’m learning to build safeguards. For major pieces of work, I seek feedback from trusted peers before submission; and I create space to emotionally detach once the work is done so that if criticism comes I can ask myself is this useful? Is it credible? Is it just noise?

And above all, I’m trying to remind myself that I don’t have to wait for perfect conditions to do good work. I can submit it knowing it may be misunderstood. I can release it even if the reception might sting. Because the value of what I create isn’t defined by how well it is received, but by how well it is made.

That thought doesn’t make the next step easier. But it does make it possible.