Here are a few tips that have worked for me to achieve the desired kind of big picture awareness and mental state suitable both for flow and for strategic thinking:
- keep a simple per-project todo list (I use a text file that I edit with emacs in text mode, one item per line. Delete when finished).
- realize that if you are procrastinating it might be because part of your brain disagrees with a decision you have made. Reflect on the decisions and uncertainties you feel, and let any objection come to the surface of your consciousness. Often the remedy is pretty quick and the procrastination disappears.
- escape the echo chamber. Maybe some people in your life are reinforcing stupid decisions or criticizing good ones. Be brutally honest with yourself and believe in yourself. Seeking social validation is in many ways a crutch.
- environment matters (people, architecture, city, flat, office, etc.). Be picky and find one that gives you the right mix of ingredients for productivity, inspiration, and happiness and doesn't make you feel bad about yourself, discouraged, etc. It may be very different than what works for other people or what is trendy.
"realize that if you are procrastinating it might be because part of your brain disagrees with a decision you have made."
Now THAT sounds like wisdom
Seconded. What an insightful way to look at it.
This is a great example for those skeptics who claim there is never a magic recipe for anything. Looking back at all the times that I remember procrastinating, knowing this would have moved things forward a lot faster.
You can take this a step further and track these instances for retroactive pattern recognition and naming. Sometimes your unconscious reasons can only be named after years of subsequent life experience. Both reasons and names may be unique to you or your cohorts, which is why the all-encompassing term 'procrastination' is less than helpful.