Tips to overcome complacency

Procrastination and complacency are those two siblings that can potentially stop someone from making meaningful progress in life. There are many stages in the human life when complacency can spell a certain downfall or leave you repenting with missed opportunities. Here are some tips to fight complacency. (As I have been a content and freelance writer, I will discuss things keeping a writer in mind).
Set Goals
If there are certain things to fulfill, there is a natural tendency of working towards reaching the destination. One can easily enjoy the efforts and the struggle of realizing the goal. Working without having goals is like roaming around aimlessly. But keep in mind that you have to set reasonable and achievable goals, which can be fulfilled. When setting goals keep in mind your drawbacks and downsides.
Set Deadlines
Keeping the topic in mind, the length of the article and your proficiency in the matter, you can set the deadline. Try to complete the article before the time is up. But yes, make sure the quality isn't compromised with.
One way to check if you can meet the deadline is writing on your favorite topic around 300 words and see how long it takes. You can always experiment in every possible way.
Get inspired
At times it gets difficult to get going. There are a hundred to say and not a word comes. Many term this situation as 'writer's block'. It is a very common thing and nothing to take too seriously about. Read success stories of other people and get to know what all they went through before success followed them.
Accept yourself as you are
This is very important - accepting yourself as you are. Many times one fails to understand the limits and tries to overdo things. That will not take you anywhere. You will have to work within your limits. That will be more practical and logical than trying to stretch yourself and trying to reach where you haven't reached before.
Don't compete with anyone else
Yeah, this is equally important as is the above factor. Do not compete with anyone else in your field. Such a competition cannot be always between the equals, because many times the competition is only at face value. Both you and the person you are trying to compete with can have different backgrounds. Taking that into account, it will not be practical to do so.
But if you need to compete, do that with yourself. A competition with oneself is the best one. See, how much distance you can cover more today than you did yesterday.
Small steps will certainly take you far before you know.
A final word
Show a little greed when it comes to achieving your goals. This is the best way to keep continuing to reach your target one day. Be consistent. Instead of working for ten hours in a day, work for lesser time but without fail. If you cannot run, then walk, if you cannot walk then crawl. But keep proceeding and don't worry about the obstructions on the way. That is the little secret to success.