We’ve all been there. One minute you’re checking Instagram just to see the new photo your friend posted and before you know it, you’re watching Greg the Basset Hound lick peanut butter off the side of a tub two hours later.
Textbooks lay untouched and unloved at your side. You turn on Netflix to watch a few Grey’s Anatomy episodes until suddenly it’s two in the morning and you forgot about your exam that’s at eight in the morning. Maybe your friends invited you to IHOP later that evening and you tell yourself, “I’ll eat a few pancakes and then finish Spanish right after.” Before you know it, you’ve had four refills of orange juice, it’s midnight, and the only words you remember are queso and chimichanga.
It happens to the best of us.
Heck, even Leonardo da Vinci took sixteen years to finish the Mona Lisa because he was an easily distracted man. Mozart procrastinated writing the prelude to Don Giovanni until the night before it was performed onstage for the first time. Frank Lloyd Wright created Fallingwater, one of the most iconic National Historic Landmarks, only hours before it was supposed to be presented to his employer.
Sometimes we just lose track of time.
Despite what your mom told you before every test in high school, there are some unexpected advantages that come with waiting until the last minute.
First of all, those few precious moments right before the due date will give you an instant kick of energy and excitement.
With the fear of failure cheering us on, we type our essays fast and furious. We research like there’s no tomorrow and we power through those flashcards as the sweat trickles down our foreheads.
Eyes twitching.
Heart pounding.
The fear we have in that moment pumps adrenaline through our bodies, which acts as a natural anesthetic. It decreases our sensitivity towards pain, and therefore the harder, more unpleasant tasks become easier.
Second, procrastination generates focus.
In those few seconds before the deadline, it’s just you and your work. The mission becomes everything. We nosedive into a state of hyper-focus and the rest of the world just disappears. Emails, text messages, and loud roommates become unimportant and unnoticed as we remain dedicated to finishing the assignment.
It also makes other mundane projects seem less agonizing, like washing the dishes and taking out the trash. Because you would rather do anything except the major tasks, you end up happily scrubbing the baseboards and dusting every fan in the house.
Although procrastination does have its own little perks, in the end it’s always better to plan ahead, especially for the bigger assignments. A boost of energy and sudden focus doesn’t always equal quality stuff.
But when it happens, accept the challenge and get it done.
