Procrastination is one of the few problems felt universally, and it has only gotten worse with the deluge of apps, platforms and websites that have emerged to dominate every ounce of attention.

If you’re an “active procrastinator”– you do your best work with the clock ticking down to the final seconds as you finish a job–procrastination may not be a problem. But if you’re a “passive procrastinator”–chronically postponing tasks and becoming indecisive, anxious, or guilty–you may want to work on modifying that habit.

This free PDF ebook from TechRepublic offers a few strategies for keeping yourself from sinking into the procrastination abyss.

From the ebook:

1. FIGURE OUT WHY YOU’RE PROCRASTINATING

The obvious starting point in dealing with procrastination is to analyze why it’s happening. It might be that the work itself is ill conceived or you don’t have clear instructions or the necessary tools, skills, or resources. Maybe the scope is intimidating or you haven’t been given a deadline, so it’s easy to defer the project. Those issues may be out of your control, but often you can do something about them. And if you can, you should. If the work itself is manageable and you know what you have to do to complete it–but you just hate doing it so you’re stalling–you may have to trick yourself to get it done.