In the life of an average teenager, the worst problem they would face is not their phone dying, but really, the worst and most common issue of procrastination. Procrastination, to many, is being lazy or putting off a task until the last minute. To be completely honest, I am writing this article about procrastination along with: how to prevent it, the roots and causes, along with every other detail I am aware of about the topic, yet I still can’t prevent it. The definition of procrastination is a common misconception that makes no sense. The word procrastination is derived from the Latin verb procrastinare — to put off until tomorrow. The definition of procrastination is literally in the word, so what is it truly?
Procrastination is the deep psychological fear of failure. To put it simply, deep inside everyone, something is telling them all of the negative emotions associated with a task and therefore they don’t want to do it. The idea of putting things off is most common in people who are considered “perfectionists.”
The root cause of this issue for many people is that we don’t know how to regulate our emotions and manage them in a healthy way. Our brains see a problem, but don’t know how to solve it, so we bury it deep into a hole and forget about it, or shove it to the side. For example, a challenging assignment will easily get put off. While some might say, well no, it is laziness because I would much rather go on my phone rather than think about writing a paper,congratulations, first of all, you are self-aware, but secondly, scrolling on your phone is easy- writing an essay? Not so much. See a lot of times we think we are lazy creatures that would rather rot away eating chips or watching television, but really we want to avoid partaking in a “threatening” task. If one truly believes their procrastination is due to laziness then it no longer is procrastination, but rather being a lazy person.
As someone with huge standards set by not only them, but also their parents, procrastination has become a part of my daily life. My goal in writing this is to combat my own procrastination as I sit here at midnight writing this article. Procrastination is an endless cycle that makes a person feel bad, yet they continue to put off the task until eventually they are forced to do it, and have to face the dreaded. Despite this information being laid out in front of me and feeling like I have the secret recipe to put a halt to this endless cycle of guilt, I lack the key portion to putting an end to procrastination, the lack of procrastination.
The only way to truly end your procrastination is to just decide one day to stop procrastinating, getting rid of procrastinating. That sentence is confusing so let me explain. The only way to stop procrastinating is to wake up one day, on top of the world, and decide that you no longer want to procrastinate. That is the easy part, the hard part is actually doing it. If you are a chronic procrastinator, such as me, that is no easy task seeing as you have to face the problem before you can rid it.
While I wish procrastination was as simple as brushing one’s teeth, understanding the root cause being that people love to be perfect can help you avoid those negative emotions. It is a slow process that begins with failure, accepting failure, then finally you can beginning to tackle procrastination in itself. Picture a chef, first, they must learn to cut fruit, then make the dough, then finally they can assemble a high-quality pastry spread. It is baby steps that lead to success.
I really like your title and the talk about procrastination being a big issue for students.