I am in procrastination hell?

Question

I am in independent study high school. I do all my work at home and see a teacher twice a week. My problem is I procrastinate like you wouldn't believe. I get 2 weeks to do my work and wait until the last day and it takes all day and sometimes all night too. This is very stressful for me. I really want to quit procrastinating like this. I have to start college next year and I really need to get straight A's in college and I know procrastinating is going to hold me back. I need to squash it now! Any suggestions? (And dont say unplug the T.V. and stuff like that because I can just plug it back in)

Answer 1

I sympathize. I'm a freshman in college and I still do it. It sucks, if you figure out how to break the habit, please let me know how you did it :-)

Answer 2

Because you see no connection between you and the assignment, right? You need to take pride in what you do. The reason behind procrastination is an unconscious fear of not having one's efforts recognized, and being forced through the issue one more time at a separate occasion anyway, as schools very often do. So we think "what's the point of doing it now, they'll make me re-do it anyway".
The trick then is to be forceful about the solution you deliver.
Defend it. See everything you do as something you will do once - and only once, bringing to bear on it everything you have.
Then, lock it away and forget about it. You can, because it's DONE - and if anybody wants to argue that, they better have a pretty good reason. Which they won't, because you've done all you could.
Right?

Answer 3

Your problem does not lie in the fact that you procrastinate. Your problem lies in the fact that you give yourself permission to procrastinate.

Clearly you think that you will do just fine and you can do whatever you want. If you want to change this habit, you need to first admit the problem. The problem is NOT that you procrastinate. The problem is you are arrogant and, at least to some degree, think that whatever you are doing instead is more important.

I would suggest that you get with a trusted adult friend and meet with them one time a week for at least an hour for the specific purpose of talking about it. The only person to hold you accountable is you. If there is a school counselor you can meet with them regularly. If you have a church, then see if they have someone that can meet with you to help you out.

You have to determine what really is more important. Then settle it. If your homework is more important, then you no longer have permission to argue that it will be okay to watch TV or whatever you are doing. You are the only one that can give that permission. You settle the argument in your head once and for all. Then when the opportunity to do something else comes up, you have already determined what you are going to do. You still need to choose to do it, but at least the argument is settled. If you choose not to do it, then you cannot lie to yourself. You have to say, I am knowingly doing something that will hurt me.

The other thing to do is build in time for fun. schedule your homework time. Give it due weight to its importance (number of hours a day etc.) and then schedule in time to do stuff that is fun. You life is more than homework.

Both of these things will greatly assist you in college.

Good Luck.

Answer 4

Break up the assignment or work into 20 min blocks. Tell yourself that you can work for 20 minutes. Set a timer or your cell phone to go off in 20 minutes. Take that 20 minutes and focus all of your attention on your work. this shouldn't be hard because you know that in 20 minutes you get a break. Try it 20 minutes a night for a week, then increase it to 25 the next week and then to 30 minutes. Work for 30 minutes and take a 10 minute break. Work for 30 minutes and then break until you've managed to get all your work done. When the timer goes off, stop if you need a break. If not, reset for 10 more minutes. Good luck.

Answer 5

Why do today what you can put of 'til tomorrow?

Nah, only joking.

Righto, you're going to have to work on a treat basis! Get up early, do four straight hours, have break, do two hours and then spend the rest of the day doing anything you want without feeling guilty. Spend plenty of time on the subjects you like and the minimum, but enough to pass, on the subjects you don't like.
We all procrastinate a little, but most of the time it's just easier to do something, than think, and think, and think about doing it.

Answer 6

Here's the seven ways to move beyond procrastination, ...

1. Recognize that there is more pain in procrastinating than not
If you have procrastinated a lot you might have discovered that:

You procrastinate to avoid doing something that is boring, hard or something like that. You want to avoid that pain.

But after having some experience with procrastination you’ll probably realise that procrastination itself causes your more pain than actually just doing what you were supposed to. Realising the true amount of pain in the two choices will make it easier to get things done.

2. Force yourself to do it before you really absolutely have do it…
…and your self-esteem will go up. And the next time you feel like procrastinating remember not that you forced yourself, but that you felt better when it was done. There was a nice reward when you were done. Whenever you feel like procrastinating remember this to get you to start moving forward.

3. Create a flow
Instead of doing nothing, begin with doing something. Clean your desk, take out the garbage, wash the dishes. Just stack a couple of simple actions to create a flow, a momentum. When you’re in the flow, in that forward motion, getting started with what you have to do will be much easier. Also, cleaning up can get you too feel more motivated. A messy work-environment seems to often reinforce procrastination.

4. Get some leverage
Sometimes we procrastinate on things that aren’t just dull tasks in the office or school. Maybe you are stuck, not able to take the next step fearing some deep personal pain. If you are thinking about changing jobs or career or taking a next step in a relationship you are probably focusing on what could go wrong. Instead, get some leverage to both push and pull yourself forward.

How to: Take a pen and a piece of paper. Write down as many things as you can come up with that you will miss out on, not just now but the next few years if you don’t take this step now. Really dig down into yourself and feel that pain that you will feel not just tomorrow but in a year and the next five or ten years.

Then write down all positive and wonderful things you will experience if you take this decision and move forward to where you want to go. Think about them and write down all those things you will experience and feel, not just in the next few days but in one year, in two, in five years or ten. Get the stick and the carrot to work for you. And put the problem in a longer time perspective to really give it an emotional punch.

5. How do you eat an elephant? One bite at a time…
Don’t look at everything you have to do. One of the common sources of procrastination is feeling overwhelmed. Break it down into smaller tasks. Write them down as a list on a piece of paper. Focus on just getting that one small task or part of the big thing done. Then move on to the next. Take it one step at a time and don’t think about the rest. Before you know it you’ll be half way there.

6. Change your beliefs
The problems that repeatedly put you into a procrastinating state might disappear if you change your view on reality. Examine your beliefs. Ask yourself if you could see things in a more beneficial and effective way for yourself.

Realise you can choose you beliefs about yourself and the world. The past is not the future. You don’t have to hang to limiting belief based experiences if you don’t want to. You are here right now and you choose and can change your habits.

7. Make a small deal with yourself

Promise yourself that you’ll work on something for just 5 minutes. After those 5 minutes you can do something else if you want to. But make a note on your schedule when you will come back to the task and work another 5 minutes with it. As Bliss notes, no matter how unpleasant a task may be, you can often talk yourself into working 5 minutes on it.

Answer 7

Ok... just a thought here. Do it in spurts. 30 minutes of study, give yourself a break. If you do it like that, it makes it easier and decreases the stress. Put it in "stages". Like a paper. Stage 1: find a topic. Stage 2: Find materials. Stage 3: Write opening paragraph. If you take it in chunks, it makes it easier.

Answer 8

Fine... remove the TV and any other distractions you have. If you can't do that, you don't want college very bad.

Answer 9

ya.. i do my homework rite when i get home and when its done i hav my fun time u should try that