Procrastination – Is It Your Friend Or Enemy?

Procrastination is something everyone may do at some point. This is especially true in college. Between having a full course load and a part or full time job on top of that, it will be much too easy to put things off and do them later. The problem is when you’re in college, assignments tend to build up. Before you know it, you’ve put things off for so long that you run into the deadline and may end up not doing the work at all. Your college professors will not be as lenient as your high school teachers may have been when you turned work in late. In fact, your professors may not accept late work at all. How do you get through procrastination in college? It may sound weird, but the key is to do that homework first. If you aren’t very good at a subject or you just really dislike the subject, you’re going to want to make that homework your first priority. The concepts taught in the class will be fresh in your head so you don’t have to search through your notes as much once you sit down to work on the homework. 

The other key point about doing the homework you dread first is that you don’t have a few days or weeks of dreading. We’ve all done it and said it – “I’m dreading writing that English essay or Math homework.” You know what happens when you don’t do it right away? It sits in your mind and then when you do have to work on the homework, you’re either angry, frustrated, or you no longer remember what it was you had to do or the concept behind it. Trust me – if you do the homework you dread first and get it done and over with, you’ll feel much better! Plus when you relax with friends and watch a movie or go shopping, the thought of the homework you have to do won’t be hanging over head and making you feel guilty for not working on it.

You may think the good part of procrastination is that it gives you focus. You know you have to get the work done, so you force yourself to work on it and shut out everything else around you. The problem is that this isn’t a guarantee. Once you’re creeping up on a deadline, you may have less focus on the work itself because you’re panicking in your head that you need to get it done. In other words, it’s going to be quite counter-productive. If you need more focus while working on homework, try things that can help you, such as going to a quiet coffee shop or bookstore to work on homework if your dorm room is distracting. Maybe you need to make a checklist and break down your homework in a To-Do List that you can cross things off as you finish them. The key is to figure out what works best for you early in college – you’re going to be in college for a while and you’ll need some good study habits. Of course you may end up adjusting or changing your study and homework habits as you go through college, that is normal as you adjust to college life. However, you won’t be able to get through college with no study and homework habits at all. Having routines down for studying and homework will help you be more efficient and even allow you more relaxing time with friends later!

Establishing a Routine in College

When you’re in college, you’re a lot more independent. You’re doing laundry on your own, possibly cooking on your own, and you have to get up and go to class without help. When you were in high school, you may not have had to worry about a routine as much. Your guidance counselor arranged your schedule and you didn’t have to do much work or planning for it. Your family made you dinner and possibly even lunch and breakfast. Your parents were there to drag you out of bed when you hit the snooze alarm one too many times. They held you accountable in a way and made sure you went to your classes even though you may have begged not to. When you’re in college, you’re going to have a lot of independence and you’re going to be doing all of these things for yourself. Having this much independence can make it easy to drift and not do things. When you’re in college, you’re going to need to establish a routine in order to get through college living with your grades intact.

First of all is your college course schedule. You’re going to be making it on your own and ensuring there are no conflicts. You’re going to meet with your advisor, but quite a large part of the planning is all up to you. You may not be able to avoid a night class or a morning class because that may be the only time the class is offered. Once you have your college course schedule planned out, you’re going to need to set up a routine for making it to class on time. There’s no one holding you accountable in college to ensure you’re out of bed or away from the TV and sitting in your college class. Make sure your alarms are set and do whatever will help you get motivated to go to class. Whether it is having your clothes out and ready the night before or to have the coffee maker programmed for when you wake up, find what helps you and establish that routine.

The college café is going to have a breakfast, lunch, and dinner schedule. If you plan on eating meals in the café, learn that schedule. Going last minute before class won’t do. Allow plenty of time to walk to the café, wait in line, get your food, and eat. Mostly allow yourself plenty of time to wait in line. If you find breakfast is a really busy time in the café, make sure you have options like oatmeal or cereal in your dorm room in case you do oversleep or don’t want to get up as early as you would have to in order to eat breakfast in the college café.

You may have had study halls built into your high school schedule in order to get your homework done or your teachers would allow you to work on homework in free time. You may have even got lucky and had both! The problem? You may have gotten used to that and you won’t have that same built in time in college. That means you need to set aside certain blocks of time to do your homework. If you don’t make time and set a certain block of hours just for studying and homework, you will find it hard to do your homework. Just like there’s no one making sure you get out of bed for your classes, there’s no one making sure that you are doing your homework. Whether you set aside time for homework in the free periods between your college classes or you wait until you’re completely done with classes for the day, set aside that time to make sure you get everything done.