The World Would Be a Better Place if Procrastination Wasn’t a Thing
As a twenty-something year old, lazy, fun-loving college student, I am practically the definition of procrastination.
I want to kick my habit more than anything in the world, trust me. But just like in the picture, I never get around to actually doing it. I notice what the problem is, and I have to say I’m pretty good at analyzing it, but when it comes to the actual execution, that’s where I fall short.
Last semester, I distinctly remember having to work on my assignment due in two weeks. I was about to start it, I promise. I sit in front of my laptop, open up my assignment questions and Microsoft Word, and hey, look, a new ASMR food video! This went on practically everyday until about two days before my assignment was due. That’s when everything started hitting me at once, and I’m sure we all know what deadline weeks are, you don’t just have one essay due, you have one essay, three tests, and fifty books to publish. That was when I started regretting everything, promising that I’d never pull this sh*t again and to be sure I start my next assignment a week before.
According to Wikipedia, procrastination leads to feelings of guilt, inadequacy, depression and self doubt. For some individuals, it could even be signs of a psychological disorder. Though it in itself is not one, it definitely leads to other, more serious psychological diseases such as anxiety and depression (I’m definitely speaking from experience here). Researchers had found that procrastination is more prevalent in people who have a fatalistic and hopeless attitude towards life. It is said that procrastination decreases with age, but I’m almost 100% certain that I’m getting worse day by day.
In an ideal world, I would finish all my assignments ahead of time, be able to get off my a** and work whenever I needed to, have a schedule I’d actually stick to, and never lose track of time doing meaningless things (and still have time for ASMR food videos). I looked up ways and steps to stop or help procrastination, and found a couple of good ways on MindTools.com that I’m sure I will get to trying later (I’m kidding).
- Recognizing procrastination
Honestly, I don’t think I don’t really need to elaborate on this. The moment you feel “I should be doing this instead of this”, you know you’re procrastinating. - Work out the reason why
For me, most of the reasons for my procrastination are things such as “being able to do it later” and “not feelin’ it”. A good way to overcome this is to be more organized, for example having to-do lists and schedules or journals, ones that you actually stick to. I know, saying is easier than actually doing, but it’s all the baby steps, am I right? If you feel overwhelmed by a task, chances are you’re afraid of failing and procrastinate to instead do something that you find easier to complete. - Anti-procrastination strategies
There were quite a few here, and I just picked a few that I thought would be a little more helpful. One of the strategies were to commit to a task, and focus more on doing rather than avoiding it. When I was in high school (I went to a Chinese school, surrounded by smart kids and people who had their sh*t together at all times), I was always told this saying: 今日事，今日畢, which means to finish today’s tasks today. Clearly, all that lecturing never helped me. Another way is to promise yourself rewards, for instance taking a break by watching an episode of Brooklyn 99 on Netflix after finishing writing this story. I hope Peralta and Captain Holt are okay. It also says here that we should tackle the hardest tasks at our peak times, so if you work best at night, make sure you do your most dreaded work then so you get it out of the way.
