Procrastination! We all do it, well some of us…well maybe most of us. The better portion of us. It may seem weird how well it works for many of us.
It is something most people frown on, but I do not. I think that procrastination is part of the reason why I am so successful.
There has to be some psychological effect it has on the mind of a person who procrastinates. I like to think of procrastination in two parts: “the questioning” and “the validation”.
“The questioning” is when you finally start doing your long, overdue work, and you are under so much stress, you question why you would do this to yourself. It seems stupid that you willingly made yourself do an enormous amount of work with an imminent and looming deadline approaching.
But after you have miraculously finished the workload that should have taken you days in only a few hours, then comes “the validation.” You may feel like your work is rushed and that someone will definitely call you out for this horrendous monster of a job you did. But they don’t, they do quite the opposite.
Receiving emails and comments from professors or higher-ups complimenting and praising my procrastination work is what validates my procrastination. And that will be my downfall one day, but it has not happened yet.
Now, that does not mean that all of my procrastination work is amazing. This vicious cycle of self-destruction has backfired on me many times. Knowing how to balance chaos and time management is key to successful procrastination.
I’m going to be hypocritical; I do not think this lifestyle is healthy. It is a literal form of self-destruction. To be macabre, it is like poisoning yourself and immediately giving yourself the antidote.
I seem to get into a sort of procrastination trance. Somehow my brain works better when it is under stress, yet I feel like I am on autopilot. I have gotten so good at doing procrastination work, I have my own routine.
My physical work may start late, but I am always thinking about the steps I need to take to do my work. Whether it is writing, reading or math work, I mentally prepare myself by planning out my actions.
This is how I am able to successfully pull off time heists. Already having this mental checklist makes it easier to finish my work fast. It’s like I’m the Flash but minus the super speed and twice the anxiety.
My procrastination may also be a product of my anxiety, but who is keeping track at this point? Anyways, I do not recommend this lifestyle. This is stressful and is a horrible strategy, but it gets me through my day to day.
As you can clearly see, I am on the fence on whether or not I condone my own lifestyle. I know that many people may not work well under pressure, they need time to think about everything thoroughly.
In hope that fellow procrastinators see this, I hope you read this and realize that we all need to change our ways. We cannot keep living like this.
That was dramatic, but in my personal life, I really want to change. As a college student, leaving everything to the last possible minute may not always work out the way I want it to. I have already seen how I have had to change certain parts of my work dynamic.
To put it in simple terms, procrastination will get me nowhere in life. I am going to have an adult job one day and I cannot save all my work for the last minute.
In a sense, procrastination has been a sort of coping mechanism. Like I said before, I think psychologically I like the rush of adrenaline I get when I work near a deadline. That is not okay, I think.
In a short-term setting, procrastination may seem like an easy solution. But I know I have to mature one day and learn how to properly manage time. For the time being, I will continue to view TikTok videos about getting my life together, while I sit in bed with a load of assignments on my desk.