Procrastination
I put off writing this post...
One thing that I know constantly plagues students is procrastination. My bet is procrastination is something you’re dealing with, and I can say this with 100% certainty because I also procrastinate! I often share this image with students and ask them to select which image represents why they procrastinate.
For me, I tend to put off things that I think will take a long time because I don’t want to tackle them until I have enough time and/or bandwidth to accomplish them. Guess what? That magical alignment of time and concentration never, ever happens! I’ve come to realize that this coping mechanism is just that—it gives the appearance that I’ve done something because I looked at the project and made a conscious decision to move it to another list. See? I’ve done something. However, all I’ve really done is push it to another day and displaced (and probably increased) my anxiety to deal with later.
Earlier this week, I saw one of the best and most useful life hacks. It’s called the “two-minute rule.” Simply explained, if you have a task in front of you that will take two minutes or less, do it now and don’t set it aside to do later because if you keep doing that, pretty soon you will have a whole list of two-minute tasks that will take longer, causing you to feel overwhelmed. While this rule may not apply to studying, letting those two-minute tasks pile up creates the perfect excuse for why you can’t study. “I’ve got too many chores to do, so I’ll study after I get them done.” The thing is, you know you’ll be too tired after completing the chore list, and you’ll put off studying again. How do I know this? This is exactly what I do!
May all of you have a productive week!