This is a great question. For me, my "acid test" would be: "is the task that I feel like doing now DIRECTLY related to my goals/projects/objectives?". Several successive "no's" over a long period (like constant "no's" over a few days or weeks) MAY indicate burn-out. A few successive "no's" in isolation MAY indicate laziness, or it may indicate that you're just not in the right state of mind to be doing the particular task you've assigned to yourself.
It's worth mentioning that it's very important to consider energy levels too. Not all tasks are equal, so for instance, it'd a be a silly idea to embark on a 3-4 hour coding binge at 1am, when I know that if I had a good sleep and was wide awake, I could get the same work done in maybe 1-2 hours with a higher level of quality. I'll do some lower energy work instead, or I might even decide to call it quits for a day, wind down and just read a book - and I wouldn't consider it laziness at all. At all costs, I want to keep the quality of work up - even if it means not doing it right now. I know myself, and I trust myself that I'll get up the next morning and hack and slash away in a much better state of mind, and produce better quality work (most of the time!)
For me, forcing myself to do work that my mind just isn't in the state to do is a fast path to fatigue, unproductiveness, burn-out and "far out there's not enough time in a day, the universe is against me!"-type delusions.
Comments
This is a great question. For me, my "acid test" would be: "is the task that I feel like doing now DIRECTLY related to my goals/projects/objectives?". Several successive "no's" over a long period (like constant "no's" over a few days or weeks) MAY indicate burn-out. A few successive "no's" in isolation MAY indicate laziness, or it may indicate that you're just not in the right state of mind to be doing the particular task you've assigned to yourself.
It's worth mentioning that it's very important to consider energy levels too. Not all tasks are equal, so for instance, it'd a be a silly idea to embark on a 3-4 hour coding binge at 1am, when I know that if I had a good sleep and was wide awake, I could get the same work done in maybe 1-2 hours with a higher level of quality. I'll do some lower energy work instead, or I might even decide to call it quits for a day, wind down and just read a book - and I wouldn't consider it laziness at all. At all costs, I want to keep the quality of work up - even if it means not doing it right now. I know myself, and I trust myself that I'll get up the next morning and hack and slash away in a much better state of mind, and produce better quality work (most of the time!)
For me, forcing myself to do work that my mind just isn't in the state to do is a fast path to fatigue, unproductiveness, burn-out and "far out there's not enough time in a day, the universe is against me!"-type delusions.