How to avoid Procrastination

By Caitlin Scarpa

Procrastination: the act of avoiding or postponing a specific task is something that everyone is guilty of.  Most of the time procrastination is a result of a boring project or just plain laziness, but why do most people find it so hard to stop procrastinating?   A survey showed that about 85-90% of students have admitted to having a problem with procrastinating.  Most of the time the real reason to why people procrastinate is boiled down the “I’ll do it tomorrow” excuse.   This is most common when there is an extensive date placed on the project; many people will avoid doing it, thinking they have plenty of time until they realize they left the entire thing for the last second.  People who develop this habit usually have a very hard time breaking it.  And, ironically, many people who have a problem with procrastinating actually put-off trying to find ways to stop procrastinating.  In order to break the habit of procrastination, it needs to be replaced with good time management techniques.

One way to avoid procrastination is to make a list with specific due dates. If there is a big project, or multiple small ones it is best to plan out your time in an organised manner.  For example, if a book has to be read by a certain date, then the best way to organise it would be to divide the number of pages in the book by the amount of days you have to read it.  This will give you the number of pages you should read per day to avoid the last minute scramble.  The list would be made in order to map out what sections of the book need to be read for that day.  This will make the amount of work seem less threatening when it is broken down into smaller parts.  

Another way to break the habit would be to let others know of your project due date.  If you have friends and family pressuring you to get a project done it will most likely motivate you to do it on time. This is because many people cannot be trusted to tell themselves to work, so they need others to do that for them.   This should also eliminate some of the distractions.  If your friends know of your dead line they will be less likely to distract you from your work if they know you’re busy.

Probably one of the best ways to break the procrastination habit is the punishment and reward system.  This system should correspond with the list making system in order to work properly.  The way that it works it that you give yourself a specific amount of work for a set amount of time, and if you complete it within that time, you can reward yourself with something, such as a movie, or a snack.  But, if you don’t complete the task you have to punish yourself, by maybe canceling any plans for that night, or missing a TV program until you have all of your work done for that day.  This works well for many people because it gives them something to look forward to if they finish all of their work.

The last way to avoid procrastinating is to eliminate all distractions.  Most people just think that this means their electronic distractions, like their phones or computers, but distractions can come from anywhere.  The best way to avoid distractions would be to get out of your house.  The best place to go to focus on a project would be the library.  There, you don’t have the normal distractions of your house, like pets, food, or random chores that you suddenly remember you “need” to do.  With all of these distractions gone, it should be easier to focus and to get the work done on time.

The habit of procrastinating can only be broken if you are willing to put in a little bit of extra effort.  But that little bit of effort will go a long way by alleviating the stress of the amount of work that...you....have………….ehhh... I’ll finish this later....

Work cited

"Procrastination Statistics." Mytimemanagement.com. N.p., n.d. Web. 20 Nov. 2016.