7 Effective Ways to Deal With Procrastination in College

Procrastination is a challenge a lot of students struggle with.

Students procrastinate doing assignments and studying, which in turn affects their grades. Procrastination levels vary among students. Some collegians are just mild procrastinators and will postpone completing some tasks. On the extreme side, some chronic procrastinators will always be late to complete tasks such as assignments and struggle with deadlines. 

But what does procrastination look like in college? Here's a scenario: you have a tough test tomorrow and decide to study in the afternoon. In the afternoon, you suddenly realize your room is somewhat untidy and start cleaning instead, even though you hate it. So, now you have to postpone studying until the evening, but some social media videos start looking too enticing. So, you watch, knowing you can still pull an all-nighter since the test is not that early in the morning. 

If this random scenario sounds familiar, you might benefit from the following tips on dealing with procrastination. 

1. Admit You Might be a Procrastinator

Like any other habit, the first thing to do to break it is to admit you're doing it. If you're entertaining friends to avoid dealing with your college workload for a while, admit it to yourself. From there, you can start working on a solution. Students procrastinate for various reasons, and unless they acknowledge that they're not being as productive as they'd want to be, they cannot make the necessary changes. 

2. Eliminate Distractions 

When students procrastinate, they often switch to another unproductive activity. Consequently, they seek the best writing services to help them keep up with schoolwork. In the digital age, we have too many sources of distractions, and students might choose any of them, from watching movies to engaging in social media. 

You should eliminate the things that can pull you from your main task, such as muting or switching off your phone. Create a study area that does not have distractions, and keep your phone away when it's time to study. If you live in a generally noisy area, find a conducive environment to study or buy noise-canceling headphones to drown out the noise. 

3. Start Small 

Start small when a task is intimidating, and you don't know where to begin. For example, if you have a long paper to write and you're struggling to start, focus on the introduction paragraph. Once you're done, you can focus on each paragraph individually, and you'll be done in no time. It's easier to complete a task once you've started because starting is often hard. 

4. Know When You're Most Productive

Are you a morning person? Do you wake up feeling energized or sluggish in the morning? Are you a night person who can focus better at night? Paying attention to when you are at your peak performance can give you a good idea of when to schedule your tasks.

5. Set Clear and Achievable Milestones

Setting goals makes it easier to complete some difficult tasks. For example, when you have a lot of work, break it down into smaller parts and set reasonable milestones for completing each part. The same applies to reading; instead of trying to read an entire book, break it down into chapters and set reasonable deadlines for each chapter. If you have trouble keeping yourself accountable, find someone you can trust. But eventually, you should start developing the discipline to see your plans through. 

6. Take Breaks 

Breaks help your mind recover and thus help students maintain productivity. But you might be asking yourself, aren't breaks similar to procrastination? No. Breaks are intentional for a limited time, depending on your schedule. Procrastination is putting off a task until you start feeling the pressure from deadlines. So when handling a long assignment, you can take breaks to do activities that will cool down your mind, such as going through essaywriter.org reviews. 

7. Reward Yourself 

Beating procrastination takes time and involves adopting many good habits, such as starting assignments early or setting earlier deadlines on top of the actual deadlines to complete your tasks. Then, reward yourself when you successfully apply such productive habits. It can be through a movie, good sleep, or some tasty dessert. It helps condition your brain to want to embrace these healthy habits. However, it also means you will need self-control and discipline only to reward yourself when you deserve it. 

Singing Off

Procrastination can become a serious problem if students let it get too far. It can negatively affect your grades and you're your life in the long term. The above tips should be helpful but require students to take the initiative and start working on ending the habit now and not later.