For instance, I often get my friends to instruct me to do things when I'm having trouble getting moving: sometimes all it takes to get me to stop dithering and start making the pasta salad I agreed to bring to a party is someone agreeing when I say, "I should make pasta salad now". Or "I should go to bed now", or "I should probably pay that bill now".

You can always take this sort of approach and automate it. Unless you really need it to be a live person telling you that, I guess.