Sunday, October 26, 2008

Procrastination as a new age art form

One thing that I have learnt to do really well this year is to procrastinate. Although it might sound like an easy thing to do it is in fact an art! A professional procrastinator is as stealthy as a ninja and as self destructive as a shopaholic at a sale! No matter how much I try and put my mind to it I never seem to get my essays done ahead of time but constantly end up writing them the night before. Some of my fellow journalism class mates like to think of this as motivation rather than slacking off as they say that they are waiting for inspiration to hit (otherwise known as last minute panic). I suppose that if I think of it that way I could rationalise that by waiting until the last minute I am teaching myself how to work in the real world of short deadlines and working under pressure. The only problem with that rationalisation is that I know it’s only half true and fuelled by a desire not to do my work. So in order to combat the progressing procrastination I recruited my friends to help me. One of the ways we now use to keep us working is to have scheduled midnight coffee breaks. We actually stumbled across this method by accident one night when we were pulling an all-nighter to finish off an essay (two in my case). I would never have guessed that a scheduled break would actually help me work but it does. After supper we all head off to our respective rooms to work and later meet up for coffee/tea and sometimes biscuits (yum yum). Seeing as we are all more than a little competitive it kind of acts like a competition to see who has finished the most work thus far. Therefore I don’t know if it will work for anyone else but I thought what the hell if it doesn’t work for you, you will have at least gotten a laugh out of this post.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Yes! A great laugh, and just finding creative ways to procrastinate, before I have to do the critical load of laundry, or it will be dooommmm.

bye!!!! =)

ashleaevans said...

Tarryn, It's Ashlea here for blogs.lynn.edu/rollcamera. Thanks for your comment on my blog. Actually, ironically, I am from Cape Town, South Africa... now studying in the USA (where I write my blog from).

Your recent post on procrastination truly made me laugh... here I am procrastinating, my thesis proposal is due tomorrow, and I am spending my morning sipping coffee, reading your blog, and occasionally checking Facebook (just in case something changed since the last time I checked it - 45 seconds earlier!). I feel your pain! However, I too have found a way to combat procrastination (says me whilst procrastinating!) - I take my books and head over to Starbucks. I know we don't have Starbucks in S.A. but perhaps a Mug n Bean or a Seattle Coffee? I find comfort in doing my work in the social atmosphere, and treat myself to a coffee when I make progress on my paper. Sometimes I take earphones along, incase someone around me is too loud. I hope your study technique works... I may have recruit some classmates!!!