Everybody has flaws, that is, unless you're Emma Watson or Zac Efron. My biggest flaw, the absolute worst character trait I have is that I am a procrastinator. It's so awful. I even procrastinated writing this article because I'm a monster. It's not that I set out to be a procrastinator, that is absolutely not my intention. On the contrary, I actually set out with the intentions of getting stuff done and being super productive, but I somehow always end up in the same spot every time. So I present to you the six common stages of procrastination.
1. Unfounded Optimism
The first thing I do every week is go through my agenda and write down anything of importance: homework, exams, projects, shifts at work, deadlines, appointments; all that good stuff. Anything that causes me any remote amount of stress gets written down in my to-do hit list. This is the part where I mistakenly make myself believe I am facing my demons. Having it all out on paper gives me the opportunity to organize and prioritize what needs to be done and I usually feel super great after updating my schedule. I always tell myself that I'm going to get everything done in a timely manner like a responsible adult.
2. Distractions Disguised as Productive Tasks
This is usually where I feel the need to clean the house, delete my obscene amounts of unread junk emails that sneakily collect in my inoxes, go through my closet, clean my car; things that are overall helpful when completed, but just a shallow attempt at being productive while also ignoring the impending deadlines of the things I REALLY need to do. I still feel really good having a "plan" to tackle all of my things on my to-do list, so I have the false impression that since I am so organized and on time, I have extra time available to complete meaningless tasks which are overall irrelevant to what I should be working on.
3. Obviously Unproductive Distractions
I am a fan of pretty much any streaming platform which allows me to binge-watch television shows/movies. At this stage in procrastination, I still feel I have an abundance of time, so there shouldn't be any problem for me to watch an episode or two of my current visual media fix while I take a short breather from responsibilities. The only problem is that one or two episodes actually turns into hours of pertinent time being spent telling myself: "Just one more episode..." This is also an opportune time to take a bunch of quizzes to find out which kind of pizza/movie hero/Disney character/cute woodland animal you are.
4. Time to Get Down to Business
This is where I realize that a good portion of the week has slipped by without any of the incredible progress I expected to see by now. I tell myself it's time to stop the distractions and get serious about getting things done. Note: this usually happens during times when i have work/other unavoidable instances that reasonably keep me from getting stuff done.
5. The Panic
This is usually the part where I yell "Why am I like this?!?!" as the stress settles in while I rush to finish things in the nick of time. This is when at least 70% of my work actually gets done.
6. The Vow
After the deeds are done and I'm coasting toward relief, this is where I say "No more procrastinating". Yes, I recognize that it is an obvious lie, I just pretend I'm going to do better next time.
