Procrastinating defines your life !

Ever wonder why you procrastinate ? Perhaps the real reason why you do so ?

According to many college students, they do it to avoid doing something that they do not want to do. Of course, it could either be homework, making appointments, study for an exam, writing a paper, going to class, and the list goes on.

What do procrastinators do to in order to avoid doing the above ?

They make excuse to avoid it ! Procrastinators deceives themselves by making a lie that they will do their work on time but in reality, they really don't. One example of a procrastinator is ME.

My Life as a Procrastinator

In my daily life as a college student, I feel like I am really irresponsible when it comes to getting academic work. Honestly, when it comes to homework or big projects to do; I procrastinate but I get the job done. I could stay up till 5 in the morning or 9 in the morning writing a paper but i will go to class and give it in on time, no matter how long i stay up. I really hate doing things at the last minute but then again, it is my fault because it's my choice to do so. If the paper is due Wednesday and i am doing nothing on a Monday, then i will just lie to myself that i have so much time and i can do it on Tuesday since i have one class. The Pro for this would be I get to have some ME time on Monday and do whatever i want but when Tuesday comes, I get hit in the face with so much CONS. Cons as in, writing the paper at the last minute, no organizers, no feedback from teachers, no revisions ! I hate this lifestyle but after a while through high school, i got used to it. Except when i came to Syracuse University. The writing teachers do not joke around when it comes to writing papers. Or when i would have to take an exam, I would have to at least study a 2 days before. For a midterm exam, perhaps a one or two weeks in advanced.

Several answers that helped me..
Several Anti-Procrastination Strategies that I found useful that Professor Blumin provided for PROCRASTINATORS was Time Wasters AND Chunking the Task.


Time Wasters

Time wasters is a perfect strategy that allows me to identify what I tend to put more of my attention to as opposed to my work. After writing down all my time waster, it makes me want to say " DAMNNNN! I waste so much time avoiding my homework just doing this. This is crazy !". I realize what are my time wasters and what not to have around me when i am doing homework. I have so much potential to finish everything on time if it wasn't for these distractions but as i realized, it was only up to me to change that. This is where Chunking the task steps in...


Chunking the Task

This is such an effective strategy that allows me to break up a whole project or a big task, into tiny little pieces ! I can easily use this fir difficult, large assignments that makes me want to avoid them. What i do is just divide the task into small sections so i can do each part everyday and when i break it down, i only put 30 or minutes into the work. When i want to start on a paper, i usually procrastinate to till the last minute. Now that i can break the task into small pieces, i can write the outline one day and then the next day, i can begin half of the paper. I used this strategy for my WGS 201 reading response which is usually 3-5 pages. Breaking it down the task usually gets me high grade, wouldn't you want that as well? This doesn't necessarily have to apply to academic work. It can apply to your personal life as well like me not cleaning my room. I am such a messy person and i rarely clean my room. It makes me feel bad when i have to bring guest over and i just kick everything to the side. Now i have this strategy that i have been using like a couple of week ago. I pick up after myself every day. Like hang up my clothes one day, clean the mirror another day. Clean the dust on my table and vacuum the carpet on a Sunday. Usually it would take me a whole day to clean my room and i would waste so much time but i don't plan on doing that anymore.


Likes and Dislikes

I really like using the Chunking the Task strategy because I use it everyday. I like using the time waster because it shows me what i have to avoid in my study environment.

Frittering my time

I wasted my time during the day. Although I have a lot of free time, I did use this time properly and thus affected my academic output. Then I was introduced to the Fritter Finder.

The Fritter Finder is a tool that lays out how much free time I have during the day. The parts in purple are the times during the day that I have free, while the rest is classes. It is evident that I have a lot of free time during my day, and I should use it to make progress with my work. Before I began using the Fritter Finder, I found that I was behind in both my Maxwell 123 class, and my buddhism class. I thought before that I would do my assignments at night, but the problem is I am not a night person. The fritter finder showed me that I have a lot of free time during the day and I should use it. The fritter finder also showed me that on the days that I have breaks between classes, I should use that time rather than waste it by doing nothing. I have found the time between Buddhism and CLS very useful to either get some CLS work done or make sure I am caught up on all of my work.

The fritter finder has been very effective in helping me better use my time. For example, I only have one class on Tuesday, and I have to have all of the readings done for my MAX and REL classes by Wednesday. Before frittering my time, I would have elected to do my MAX readings on tuesday and save my religion reading for Wednesday, the last possible day I had to read. After Dr. Blumin recommended that I use the Fritter Finder, I have found ways to get my work done very early in the day, so I have a lot of time at night to relax, rather than stress out about my work load. I chose this strategy because it really allows me to see all the time I had been wasting and makes me regret my past decisions.