Overcoming Procrastination
Written by Lauren Smyth
Have you ever looked at your to-do list for the day, decided it was way too long, and gotten back into bed without getting anything done? Welcome to the sweet world of procrastination. If you think it’s bad over the summer, when free time abounds, just wait until you get your next 20-page paper assignment. That’s some serious motivation to watch Netflix.
The problem many students face is that there is comparatively little accountability in college. Don’t feel like showing up to class? Nothing will happen if you don’t. Want to spend the night finishing up a Monopoly game, even though you have a midterm tomorrow? Your mom isn’t going to tell you “no” or “you’ll regret this in the morning” or “you do realize that you’re paying money for the classes you’re skipping, right?” College is an exercise in self-motivation. And procrastination is a fierce opponent of motivation.
For the record, procrastination isn’t necessarily a bad thing when it’s defined as “putting things off until later.” If you have a journalism article due at the same time as a Great Books paper, you might want to finish the paper before writing the article, since it’s likely to be longer and harder. You’re technically procrastinating, and you may well end up writing the article the night before it’s due. But this is simply an exercise in good judgment and time management, not the kind of procrastination that will kill your grades. You would also be procrastinating if you were completely exhausted, so you decided to take a nap before you do any writing at all. But, once again, this isn’t necessarily a bad decision. Sometimes you’ve just got to have a nap.
The really dangerous procrastination is the type where, instead of doing something, you do nothing. It’s the procrastination where you sit down to study and look up from your phone an hour later, realizing it’s time for dinner and you haven’t solved a single math problem. Or you fake being busy, ironing your shower curtain and polishing your door handles to avoid more urgent tasks. This is the type of procrastination that results in missed deadlines and to-do lists with backlogs that become more daunting every day you put them off. Worse still, it quickly becomes a habit that requires tremendous willpower to break.
The best way to defeat this type of procrastination is to prevent it from happening in the first place. Forming good habits keeps the bad ones away. This, of course, is easier said than done, but there are a few tricks that can help.
Having a clear reason for the work you’re doing can often stave off procrastination. I spend monumental amounts of time studying, and one of my reasons for doing this is the fact that I want good grades so I can attend law school. This is a far-off motivator, since I still have two years before graduation, but I’m the kind of person who enjoys thinking ahead. (Which is not always a good idea, by the way.) If you aren’t a two-year-planner, you may want to choose something that will happen within the immediate future. Maybe you want to study hard so that when you take the test you’ve been dreading, you can enjoy the overwhelming sense of relief that comes from knowing, before you even leave the classroom, that you passed with flying colors. Or maybe you prefer to create a different kind of motivator: If you pass the test with an A, you’ll treat yourself to some ice cream from AJ’s Cafe.
Another tip to keep the procrastination away is to choose a location or item that you associate with studying. Use it to put yourself in the right headspace for work. For example, I study in a specific room in the library when I know I really need to focus. Whenever I’m in that room, my brain clicks into “work as hard and as fast as possible” mode, usually because I have a midterm and a thousand assignments all due at once. Conversely, I never go into that room if I’m not working so that I don’t break the association I’ve made between it and homework.
Suppose, however, you enter your special study spot and promise yourself you’ll check your phone for just five minutes, only to look up after a series of YouTube videos and wonder where all your time went. It happens. There’s no need to beat yourself up about it. But it’s important to break the cycle of procrastination the moment it kicks off to avoid making it a habit.
The first key is to set achievable goals. If your to-do list has gotten so backlogged with overdue tasks that you aren’t even sure where to start, it’s time to begin un-obligating yourself. Were you supposed to send an email a week ago, and now the opportunity for sending it has passed? Scratch that off your list. Did you promise a friend you’d bring them apples, but you just can’t seem to make it to the grocery store? Apologize as best you can and try to follow through next time. If the tasks occupying your to-do list are so far from being priorities that you can continually put them off, you could probably put them off forever by simply not doing them. Once you’re done with this sifting step, everything left on your list should be mandatory tasks. And your list should be much shorter.
While you attack those remaining items, don’t forget to give yourself breaks. But make sure they’re intentional breaks. Good breaks are restful. Bad breaks make you feel guilty afterward because you took them at the wrong time or spent them doing the wrong thing. Checking your phone can be a good break if you set a timer for ten minutes or if you wait to do it until more urgent tasks are complete. It can become a bad break, however, if you don’t realize how much time it’s taking and if you don’t prioritize. There’s a time and place for everything.
Finally, make sure you’re spending time with friends. No matter how introverted you are, you’re almost certain to have a better day if you socialize. This doesn’t mean you have to make small talk in the cafeteria for two hours. “Socializing” includes studying with friends, moving a heavy shelf with friends, exercising with friends—in short, anything with friends. If you find yourself falling into a rut of exhaustion and frustration with the repetition of studying, homework, and deadlines, an afternoon spent with friends can help realign your perspective. There’s a whole world outside those textbooks piled on your desk (believe it or not), and your friends can remind you of that.
If you can learn to avoid procrastination now, you’ll be able to do it all at college, keeping up a social life, enjoying extracurriculars, and achieving good grades.
Lauren Smyth, ’25, is an economics major and journalism minor. Outside of starting arguments in philosophy class, she enjoys curling up on a bench outdoors (sun, rain, or snow) to write novels or articles for her blog, www.laurensmythbooks.com.
Published in November 2023