It’s Sunday night, the sun is starting to set and you finally have to acknowledge the massive amount of work you’ve been putting off all weekend. No matter how many times you try to get things done earlier, your brain just won’t seem to listen. The thought of sitting in a Mckeldin Library study carrel, stuffed into a corner chair with only your laptop and a pair of headphones, is nauseating.
But, work has to get done, and you’ve put it off for long enough so its time to realize your grades are a tad more important than catching up on the latest “Grey’s Anatomy” episode. Still the night drones on and you still stare at the blank page on your computer screen unable to write that paper. You re-read the same textbook notes over-and-over again but they refuse to process in your brain.
We are in the age of procrastination and us college students will do everything in our power to ignore our educational responsibilities and procrastinate to our hearts content. Most of us would practically do just about anything to avoid our school work.
Here are a few of our methods:
1. Eat food
Yes, we pretty much are eating food whenever we find free time in our day; so why not add study time to the mix. The boredom of studying can leave us needing a quick yogurt trip or pizza run. Though as soon as you know it the common “I’m just getting a snack,” turns into a mozzarella stick, french fry and chicken finger binging spree at the diner. Seemingly you can never get enough food in your mouth and by the time you’re finished you’re so stuffed the thought of doing work makes you want to vomit.
2. Excercise
I realize this doesn’t apply to everyone but for most of us exercise is our natural and go-to form of procrastination. Working out is linked directly to the satisfaction of happiness: endorphins that calm your nerves. The endorphins in your body become happy through physical exercise and any stress that you may have felt before will disintegrate.
When you have a test to study for or a paper to write your anxiety level is at an all time high. Going to the gym is possible to cause you more stress due to the aspect of time management. But in the end you choose to run on a treadmill rather than do your work because one is a choice while the other is basically a punishment.
3. Go out drinking
Sunday drafts has never looked better than when you are forced to write a 10 page paper. Drinking and more drinking tends to be the majority cause of college students procrastination. One day drink turns into a bar night and before you know it the entire day has been wasted (and the hangover tomorrow ill ruin that day as well) and you still have done zero work.
The aspect of drinking with friends is to exciting and fun to give up. Missing out on one single minute of the alcoholic haze will definitely give even the least outgoing college student intense FOMO.
Think about it this way. If you had the choice to stay in on a Sunday night and drink wine while watching a rom-com, and the choice of working on a team project with a hot football player, what would you choose? In reality, no matter who the football player is wine triumphs school work any day (boys be damned.)
Each night we spend procrastinating in avoidance of our school assignments drives into a spiral off all-nighters and daily crashes. Will we stop the cycle? Probably not. But maybe one day we’ll stop talking about how much we want to stop procrastinating (as a procrastination technique) and actually get our work done before its designated due date.