As I type this out, I check the clock.

Article's due in two and a half hours.

Plenty of time, right?

So yeah, just so you know, I'm a master procrastinator-- and I don't take that title lightly. The art of procrastinating is more finesse than most people suspect; it's not just sitting around, stalling and killing time. It's a mindset, a lifestyle, psychological acrobatics.

If you're here, it's because you're looking for tricks the experts use. The stuff you won't hear from your store-brand listicle. This isn't going to be a column filled with Netflix suggestions and other entry level techniques. Of course it's not; what is this, amateur hour?

Get ready to actually kick your procrastination game up a notch.

1. Work on a new recipe

This one gets better the worse at cooking you are, but I assume it works for all levels of cooking expertise. Recipes can be an art, and sometimes, you gotta devote a little time to hone your craft. But if you want to make that "little time" into "a lot of time," you don't have too far to go.

Mainly, this one made the cut past the brainstorming stage because it's gonna eat up more hours than you'll realize. I know when I cook I'm so disorganized that a single 15 minute prep time can stretch to double that. Add in cleanup, and suddenly you're looking at the perfect way to shirk your responsibilities. Think of all the emails you could respond to in the time it takes to mince that garlic. And that's just one step in the process!

2. Invest in "rabbit hole" websites

Considering I just made that term up now, we should start this section off with a quick explanation:

A "Rabbit Hole" website is any site where you can click and click and click and still find entire pages worth of things to read.

A pretty decent place to start (and never end, really) is tvtropes.org, a compendium of tropes used in various media. I recommend this one mainly because of its increasing returns—you can browse the site's pages of all the TV shows you already love, and every time you binge a new show on Netflix, you can go back and get lost in that show's page for another couple hours. It's like the gift that keeps on giving!

There are plenty of places you can stumble into and fall into Wonderland. I'd give more suggestions, but it also helps tone your procrastination muscles to get out there and idly browse the internet on your own. You're not going to crumble into motivationless dust with me doing all the work, are you?

3. Reorganize your wardrobe for the next, like, four seasons

It's one thing to get your fashion in order for an upcoming three months, but a whole other crusade to prepare outfits, schedule precisely timed laundry days and browse online outlets. See, the core trick to increasing your procrastination productivity is going completely overboard on absolutely asinine things, you know?

So don't just stare into your closet and move a few hangers around. Dig your heels in and start brainstorming. Match shades, coordinate your belts and sweaters, plan your holiday getup. Find a way to squeeze the last bits of juice out of every leisure activity you do, so when the harbinger of homework comes knocking, you'll have eight pointless micro-tasks lined up to barricade the door.

4. Develop a perfectionist mindset that cripples your ability to keep focus on your obligations knowing that you're constantly under- performing based on unrealistic expectations you have for achieving simple, everyday goals

Now we're getting into the real meat. It's one thing to sit absentmindedly and cycle through your bookmarked websites; it's another to really crack open your psyche and figure out what turning gears you need to be sabotaging.

So, despite all efforts, you find yourself sitting with a pile o' work in front of you, about to, dear heavens, actually do it. If you really are intent on keeping your procrastination chords nice and tuned, you'll need to realize that sometimes, your work doesn't get done because you're focused on what you believe the result should be, not what it will be.

Perfectionism is at the core of many people's desire to succeed. You may not classify yourself as a perfectionist, but you surely have a tiny bit of it in your blood. After all, what's the point of success if it was only half-hearted, or looks half-hearted to the outside world? It can be pretty scary.

And if you let that crippling fear of being exposed as a fraud take over your thinking, then you'll surely be able to procrastinate straight into oblivion! Honestly, this has to be my number one tip for all you budding procrastinators out there.

5. Get into the psychological nitty-gritty

I want to show you a video, but I'm going to make you look it up yourself because I want to make sure that you don't procrastinate on this.

Go look up "Inside the Mind of a Master Procrastinator," a TED Talk by Tim Urban.

Yes, a TED Talk. Classic, right? Surely, this is just a cop-out, because I've been procrastinating on writing this article and I need a good fifth point. Well, you're halfway right, but I promise this isn't a cop-out.

The message of Urban's speech is clear—beside perfectionism, the biggest factor contributing to procrastination is the power of instant gratification. It's a discipline thing at it's core, and deadlines aren't actually the best forms of discipline.

Now, whether you actually want to get better at procrastination, or realized halfway through reading this that, holy smokes, you don't want to live your life as someone that focuses on pointlessly whittling away precious time, let that idea be your guide. Deadlines do not equal discipline. The key to beating procrastination, or cultivating it, is to control instant gratification in the short term.

We all have aspirations. Some of us are better at consistently working toward those aspirations than others, but the dreams are there. Now, I'm not going to sit here and tell you procrastination is easy to beat; if I wanted to write an actual self-help guide, I would have taken that path from the start. Like Urban says, all of us have some small desire to procrastinate inside of us.

But procrastination doesn't just happen. At this point, the concept is so ingrained in our culture that we just take it for granted as something we do as a species. I have professors that joke about work handed in at the last minute because we're so self-aware of it.

It comes from some deep-seated roots, and it's not always pretty.

May you always let your dreams be in control.