Having to decide between doing something productive and not doing anything at all should be a simple choice because productivity is super beneficial. Being productive should always be your choice right? In all honesty, this choice isn't always that easy because no matter how beneficial work is, sleep or Netflix always seems much more enticing in the moment.
Why does one feel the need to procrastinate? Because it's easy. Simple as that! Below is a list that fellow procrastinators can either relate to or sympathize with. These are all personal thoughts or experiences I've had during my struggle against procrastination. It is, indeed, a real struggle.
1. Due dates, "shmoo" dates.
When you get an assignment and it’s due in a week, and you’re stoked because a week is equivalent to a year in the assignment time scale that you've so cleverly come up with. Then the week goes by and you’re stuck making a New Year's resolution to procrastinate less, even though New Years was two months ago. Better late than never.
2. Major flaws in your incentive system.
“I just did half an hour of calculus, you know what that means? Four hours of 'The Office'!” First off, good on you for focusing long enough to do calculus for half an hour, but this reward system would work a lot more effectively if we had 50 hours in a day.
3. Priorities anyone?
Just because you procrastinate doesn’t mean that you don’t have priorities. Quite the contrary. You decide what to procrastinate on the most as opposed to what you can semi-procrastinate on. Voila! Prioritizing.
4. Alarms!
Personally, I set six alarms. You may be thinking to yourself, “Woah Georgette, six? Isn’t that a bit much?” Yes. Yes it is, but you don’t understand how hard it is to wake up after you’ve spent all night avoiding doing actual work. It’s exhausting.
5. Sleeping versus looking decent?
The answer is always sleep. By the third alarm I know I’m either going to look like Britney Spears during her melt down or worse, but does that stop me from hitting the snooze button? Nope. Someday I’ll find something that’s appealing enough to wake up for, but for now, I’m just snoozing through it.
6. Planned procrastination.
"How do you college?" You know, I’m still trying to figure that out. As you can tell right now I’m trying out the procrastination route, and I think it’s safe to say that I’m such a rebel. But in actuality, I’ve gotten this far because I plan my procrastination ahead of time (just like how I plan my mental breakdowns, but that’s another topic for another day). I make a point to make to do lists and on the list I make sure to write how long I can put them off before I’m in the ‘danger zone’. This might seem a little crazy, but it’s gotten me this far.
