Journal Writing Project: A day in the life of a slacker

I, a high school senior, have troubles with putting things off until the last minute. Shocker, right? I’m the type of person who will wait until I have to do a project rather than get a head start on it. If the homework isn’t due until Friday, you can bet I’m doing it Thursday night. I’m not the only one who does things like this, though. There are actually a lot of people who procrastinate way more than they should.

There are a few different reasons for procrastination. Perhaps you don’t know how to do something, or you don’t feel motivated enough to do it. Some people fear that they will do too well, some feel they won’t do well enough. There are those that enjoy the rush of having a small time frame to do things. Whatever the reasons are, the fact still remains that most people will procrastinate at some point in their life, if not more.

One of the most common reasons given for putting things off is a lack of motivation. People believe that without motivation to complete a task, they must be doing something wrong. In reality, a person has to do something before the motivation kicks in. I personally am guilty of feeling this way at many times. Disinterest also falls into a similar category. If you aren’t interested in doing the essay, you are likely to procrastinate the essay. (Guilty as charged.)

Lacking skill to perform a task is another simple reason for procrastination. Logically, if you can’t do something, you push it to the side. A person would sometimes rather seem uninterested in the task than viewed as “stupid” or unable to complete it. It’s similar to if you had math homework to complete. You don’t want to look dumb, so you put it off, giving the impression that you just didn’t feel like doing it rather than you couldn’t do it.

If someone fails at something, the usual thinking would be “at least I tried.” Some people, who fear failure, instead think that it may be better to not try at all rather than fail. If someone puts off a project (again, guilty) until the last minute and just slaps something together, then they end up with the “if I had more time, I could have done better” mentality. The idea behind giving yourself less time makes you feel better that it could have been worse but also better. It’s almost like a safety net to make sure that you don’t do horribly. Opposite of this is the fear of doing too well. Some fear that if they do too well, more will be expected of them in the future.

Procrastination is extremely common, especially in this girl here. I’ve felt all sorts of reasons for putting things off until the last minute. The good news in all of this is that procrastination isn’t born; it’s made. This means that it can be “fixed”, so to speak. There are ways a person can stop procrastinating, such as seeing a counselor or finding underlying problems that may be affecting your mentality. Sometimes the solution is to literally just get up and do it. I should start looking into these things myself.
I hope you all have a good day and get things done.

“6 Reasons People Procrastinate.” Academic Success Center. N.p., 19 Oct. 2016. http://success.oregonstate.edu/learning/6-reasons-people-procrastinate
Yasmin Scrabeck is a student at Mabel-Canton High School. She is one of eight area students participating in the Journal Writing Project, now in its eighteenth year.