Procrastination: My Perspective & How to Tackle It
By Zlatoslava
It is common among working people to procrastinate. But did you know it is two to four times more common among students?
As a student, you often have fewer obligations and more freedom to organise your day, which can easily lead to falling into the procrastination rhythm.
Recently, I attended a workshop about procrastination offered by the Student Training & Support Study Lab. In today’s blog, I want going to share some of the highlights from it together with my personal perspective.
Personal Experience
Currently, I am in my third year of my Bachelor’s, and have recently returned from my exchange semester abroad! If there is one thing that this exchange made me realise, it is that I want to experience more. I am always up for a spontaneous activity or going out, whether with friends or solo. However, looking back on my past two years here, I sometimes feel like there could have been more of those moments.
This brings me to another thought. I often struggle to find the right balance between my personal life and other responsibilities like studying, work, and daily tasks. I’m ambitious to the “overachiever” extent…aaand a perfectionist. I often want to finish all my tasks as perfectly as possible. However, because of that, I usually end up not doing them at all or leaving them until the last minute.
High expectations, stressed, and never meeting my own expectations. Honestly, this is quite tiring, and things need to change. I can say with a smile on my face that I’m working on this, and things are starting to improve, bit by bit!
So, if you are like me, know that you don’t have to and actually cannot be perfect – nobody can. Look at it from the bright side!😊
Now, let’s dive straight to the tips from the workshop and see if there is something nice for you.
Use the questions below to navigate your way through coming up with an answer about how to improve your procrastination.
I’ve answered them too, so feel free to use it as inspiration if you need to! ✨
How would you like to study & what is your ideal study routine?
Being able to envision your ideal (study) day is key! This will help you with planning and focusing on the important aspects of it. Take all circumstances into account and try the following:
- List everything that comes to mind when you hear “What do you want to do?”
e.g. I want to catch up with 2 missed lectures today. - How are you going to do it? The more specific, the better! Take a moment to visualise the environment, the methods, the tools you’re going to use.
e.g. I am going to start after breakfast, and I will study for 3 hours and take a break every 40 minutes. - Now, let me stop you. All of the things you listed above will most likely overwhelm you as you try to fulfil them and when that doesn’t happen, it will eventually lead to disappointment. Instead, ask yourself, “Is this realistic and can I do it?”
- Adapt!
Be compassionate with yourself, allow break-time, and gaps for unpredictable events or distractions (happens to everyone😉). Rewrite the things you just put down and adapt them to a realistic daily routine. - Lastly, think about “How such a day would make you feel?”
Give credit to yourself for the hard work you’ve done! The feeling of accomplishment is desired by most of the people, including me. We all want to feel happy and proud of ourselves, right?😇
For me, studying ideally happens in the morning when my mind is still fresh. Four hours with enough breaks is optimal for a regular study day. The rest of the day, I would like to spend some time on my personal interests – cooking meals, going out to see friends, go do sports. Some days we all have more to study, so four hours might not be enough. However, for a balanced day, I strive for what I’ve mentioned.
Tip: Think of a time when you enjoyed studying and managed to get your management right. What was different back then? What changed, and how can you make the environment or the motivation similar again?
Another useful trick is making a plan for the next day so that you know what, how and when to start with.
Tip from a fellow student: One student shared a really interesting approach that they use. This week, they start by doing focused work for only 25 minutes, and with each week, they ad 25 more. It might not seem a lot in the beginning, but as time passes and you look back, you’ll realise how far you’ve come!
When you’re studying the way you would like, you are like…what?
Most of us already know the usual “plan your day, be positive and realistic”. Yes, they are the basics after all, that’s why I’m also discussing them on here. However, the following approach is something you don’t come across every day. Due to that, it has had an impact on me. Being a new and extraordinary method, it made me remember it and come back to it.
To answer the question, use metaphors to describe yourself! A common one is being like a sponge, absorbing all the knowledge and information. Being a detective, finding and understanding how things work is also an alternative.
My take on this was that I would like to be like a bee🐝. I reach a flower, I get my work done properly, but afterwards, I continue to fly.
I want to enjoy those moments to the fullest without guilt or pressure of the fact that soon I’ll be approaching another flower/study moment. Personal life is just as important and should be enjoyed to the fullest.
The elephant method 🐘
Coming with another interesting one! The mentor told us that humans’ brains can be compared to a rider and an elephant. Sounds strange, but bear with me, haha.
The elephant is our emotional and instinctive traits, while the rider is the cognitive part of the brain responsible for planning.
The rider knows what has to be done and starts going it, but the elephant usually takes over and goes its own way. It is much stronger, and its decisions are easily influenced by side factors.
For example, if you’re unmotivated or distracted by various thoughts, then concentrating will be difficult. Let’s say your desk is not clear and you have chocolate next to you. I don’t know about you, but I’ll be for sure thinking a loot about tasty chocolate🍫. Even now, when writing about it, my thoughts are going sideways. Back on track!
What motivates your elephant?
Finding a way to make your elephant go along with your plan as a rider is crucial.
Start with the small bits! They will help you to have a sense of control, and over time, this will help you build confidence that you are capable. Another way is to use “social pressure”. When you study with friends or go to the library, you’re less likely to distract yourself because you feel accountable for doing your work.
What de-motivates your elephant?
Already told you about the chocolate example. Similarly, from my perspective, it’s that “Studying will take too much time”, but by procrastinating, I make it even longer. It is better not to think too much about it because it has to be done either way. I usually have the problem of not fully enjoying other activities when I know I have something else I need to finish. Therefore, starting in this exact moment and enjoying guilt-free them afterwards works best for me.
What can you accept/change/leave?
There are situations where time is not enough, but things have to get done. Let’s take as an example our well-known..trigger warning.. uni deadlines.🙂
In such cases, you have a couple of ways to deal with the problem. Some of them are high risk-high reward, while some are hard work-high reward. You have to decide which is worth picking. You can:
- Change it by taking action and doing your best
- Accept your procrastination and don’t do anything about it, hoping that the outcome of what you have now is enough. This means not finishing your tasks, but also not feeling bad about it.
- Leave it by deciding you won’t be doing the assignment, and you won’t be taking this course anymore.
To finish on a positive note, know that burnouts are common and they are often caused by overwhelming yourself. Even if today wasn’t perfect, you did your best. You tried, and if it didn’t work today, tomorrow you get to try again.
If you need more tips, I’ve got you covered with a very useful blog on daily planning and management!
Would you give any of those a try? Hope it works, I’m rooting for you!😁
See you around,
Zlatoslava
