From Excuse To Execution: Why Myron Golden Says You Don’t Have a Procrastination Problem

Are you tired of putting things off until “tomorrow,” and then finding that tomorrow becomes “tomorrow’s tomorrow”? We constantly label ourselves as procrastinators, but business consultant and speaker Myron Golden argues that this diagnosis is fundamentally wrong.

In his teaching “Go From Excuse Maker To Action Taker,” Golden posits a liberating truth: “I’ve never met a person in my life with a procrastination problem.”

According to Golden, procrastination is never the problem itself; it is merely a symptom. The root cause is that you are associating more pain than pleasure with the act of getting the thing done. If you can flip that association—linking more pleasure than pain to the activity—you will execute immediately.

To move from excuse maker to action taker, you must master the mechanics of your mind. Here is Myron Golden’s detailed blueprint for dismantling the cycle of delay and entering “Now O’Clock.”

Phase 1: The Head (Facts, Focus, and Belief)

Golden explains that the cycle of action begins with how we process reality. It starts with The Facts.

However, Golden emphasizes a crucial nuance: “There’s no such thing as a purely positive fact, and there’s no such thing as a purely negative fact.” Every situation has both positive and negative aspects.

The Frame When you observe a fact, you put a “frame” around it. This frame is your focus. You have the agency to focus on either the positive aspect or the negative aspect.

• Focusing on the negative makes you sad or avoidant.
• Focusing on the positive energizes you.

The Misconception of Doubt Your focus creates your belief. If you focus on the positive, you manifest Faith. If you focus on the negative, you manifest Doubt. Golden offers a profound redefinition of doubt: “Doubt is not the absence of belief.”

• Faith is the belief in the outcome you desire.
• Doubt is the belief in the outcome you do not desire.

We often trick ourselves into thinking we believe things because they are objectively true. Golden argues the opposite: “People think things are true because they believe them.” If you are hyper-intentional about focusing on the positive aspects of facts, you build a belief system that propels you forward rather than holding you back.

Phase 2: The Heart (Anticipation vs. Anxiety)

Once a belief is formed in your head, it travels down to your heart to produce a feeling. Golden states clearly: “Feelings are the fuel of action.” Human beings are singularly motivated—we do what we do because we feel like it.

The Energy of Anticipation When you focus on the positive and manifest Faith, your heart produces Anticipation. Golden compares this to a child on Christmas Eve. You can’t sleep, not because you are worried, but because you are “energized by your expectation of a magnificent future.” This energy allows you to wake up early and get to work without hitting the snooze button.

• Golden’s Personal Example: He wakes up at 5:00 AM not because he loves waking up early, but because he focuses on the pleasure of the result: hitting his golf drive 300 yards. The anticipation of the future victory overrides the pain of the present discipline.

The Thief Called Anxiety When you focus on the negative and manifest Doubt, your heart produces Anxiety. Golden describes anxiety as the “thief of our dreams” because it causes us to waste today’s energy worrying about tomorrow’s problem.

Anxiety is Not Fear One of Golden’s most critical distinctions is the difference between anxiety and fear. He uses the analogy of a Bobcat vs. an Alligator:

• Fear is caution over a real, present danger. If you are on a golf course and see a live alligator next to your ball, that is fear. It is a survival mechanism.
• Anxiety is caution over a future, imagined danger. If you walk into a dark parking lot and imagine a bobcat might be there (because you saw a video of one earlier), that is anxiety.

Anxiety creates physical symptoms—sweaty hands, heart palpitations, shallow breathing—that leave you exhausted before you even begin.

Phase 3: The Hands (Power vs. Powerlessness)

The feeling in your heart produces a “function in your hands.” This is the moment of execution or excuse.

• Anticipation leads to POWER: When you have the energy of anticipation, you have the power to act. You don’t procrastinate because you are pulled forward by the joy of the expected result.
• Anxiety leads to POWERLESSNESS: When you are anxious, you feel drained. This lack of power forces you to say, “I’ll do it later.” This is the true mechanics of procrastination.

The Solution: How to Execute Right Now

If you are stuck, it is because you are envisioning the plan not working. Myron Golden provides specific, tactical steps to hack this biology and get it done:

1. “Faith is Created in the Ears” Golden notes that doubt is often created in the eyes (by what we imagine or see), but faith is created in the ears. If you cannot mentally envision the project working, Golden advises:

• Sit down and write out every positive thing that will happen when you complete the task.
• Read it out loud. By speaking the positive outcome, you tell yourself a different story, overriding the anxiety in your mind’s eye with the faith in your ears.

2. Stop Desiring, Start Expecting Golden uses the example of writer’s block. He argues that writer’s block is simply “expecting the book not to sell.” If you knew for a fact you would sell a million copies next week, you would have finished the book yesterday. To fix this, stop “desiring” a result (like a sale) and start relying on the Law of Averages. If you present to enough people, someone will buy. When you move from hoping to knowing, you remove the paralyzing anxiety of the unknown.

3. Make it “Now O’Clock” Golden reminds us that “tomorrow” is a concept that doesn’t exist; reality is always today. By consciously shifting your focus to the positive, generating anticipation, and relying on expectation rather than desire, you can stop being an excuse maker.

As Myron Golden says, make it “Now O’Clock” and get it done.