When the lockdown was announced, we hoped we’d be finally spending time with our families and ourselves, but it ended up being rather the contrary. The lines separating home and work had nearly vanished. Many of us developed our own coping mechanisms and so did Omkar.
Hailing from Mumbai, 24 years old Omkar Dubale is an AR Specialist by profession, and in his spare hours enjoys cycling and playing the ukulele.
Omkar’s 9-5 is a little different from ours. His job requires him to cover the night shift. The schedule is certainly demanding. Omkar didn’t face any issues but he couldn’t anticipate what was coming next.
“I acknowledged the need for counselling when I started working from home. Some of my friends went through therapy and supported me to pursue the same. But I was uncertain about the process.”
It started when Omkar’s previous company announced work-from-home. Because he knew how to do his job, he began to procrastinate and spent his time binge-watching series or movies, believing it would be a piece of cake to complete his obligations at work, which it was. What he didn’t anticipate was that the practice he was building would become an obstacle to his professional growth.
He finally noticed the patterns of procrastination when he joined his new organisation. Every company has its own processes. It took him a while to get used to the same but he realised he was making errors.
“Procrastination struck when I had to rework my errors. The practice grew stronger during that period. I wasn’t paying attention to my behaviours and continued ignoring everything.”
But when his habit began to have an impact on his personal life, he realised that his routine had gotten out of control. He acknowledged he was losing a lot of time and messing up his sleep schedule too.
“Earlier, I went to bed around 5 AM, but now it wasn’t until 9-9:30 AM. Things were not well. Despite being aware of how much I procrastinate, I couldn’t find a way to make it better.”
Omkar’s will to find a way out of procrastination led him towards therapy. He found out that his company was in collaboration with YourDOST. Although he wondered if the platform was trustworthy but he eventually took his first step towards healing with Ms Mahima Nair.
Mahima assisted him with a variety of healing approaches. She encouraged him to watch motivating and positive thinking videos and coached him through several exercises.
“Mahima not only motivated me but also kept checking up on me. She was empathic and warm, which helped me to be honest with her whenever I fell behind in the exercises. She, in turn, assisted me in conquering my downfalls and introduced revamped activities.”
And soon he started noticing positive changes in his behaviour.
“I took 2-3 sessions per week with her for about 2 months and was doing well, but then I fell back into the same routine of procrastination.”
Just when he thought he can finally fly solo, he had a setback. He relapsed into a procrastination spiral, which caused him to delay his work until the next day. He even began putting off important tasks until the very last moment.
“My Team Leader was not happy, but I was wary of how to react. Things were getting out of hand, and my performance was at stake.”
This is when Omkar decided to give therapy another chance and met Mr Kailash Panwar through our platform.
“Kailash gave me brief exercises like maintaining a sheet of my daily activities so that I can reflect on the time I spent on all of my actions. I am not much of a writer kinda person and journaling wasn’t my thing. The data maintenance was indeed helpful to me. I followed it precisely and saw remarkable changes in myself.”
Omkar was so focused on his procrastination at work that he didn’t realise how much of his ‘me time’ was also being sacrificed. After his second round of therapy, he was not only able to finish his tasks on time and get back to his proper schedule, but he also had enough time to spend with his family, friends and himself.
“I came to appreciate the value of time and how easily we waste it. Once I started reflecting on my daily schedule, it was much easier to identify what I was doing wrong and what I should do instead. It greatly influenced my thoughts and me personally.”
Today, Omkar has bid adieu to Procrastination and is living a lovely life in Kerala. He moved away from home and is staying alone for the first time and spends his time interacting with the locals and picking up a little bit of the language every day.
He expressed his gratitude to his therapists and is hopeful that help will be given to the ones who ask for it.
“Thank you for making me aware of my issues and supporting me in charting my own course. And I hope YourDOST will continue their work so that people like me can progress on their own without feeling guilty about it.”
From being unsure of how therapy works to putting his faith in therapy and being comfortable with the process, Omkar found his own path. He rated himself 3.5 in terms of improvement and is confident that he’ll not look back.
Omkar’s Warrior Tips:
1. Stay true to yourself, identify your problems, and find answers to them. Every problem has a solution.
2. It is okay to have a setback. Reflect on your actions and seek help.
