Definition: to keep delaying something that must be done, often because it is unpleasant or boring
– “I know I’ve got to deal with the problem at some point – I’m just procrastinating.”
Procrastination is something we all do, some people make it an art, others make it a bad habit. Whether it is in avoidance of an essay, making a difficult phone-call or getting ready for work, procrastination is an easy distraction from realities, harsh or otherwise. These ten things are often done when procrastinating,
1. Social Media – Scrolling through Facebook or twitter, replying to a group-chat that will not pipe-down or watching one video on a recent news story and five videos later watching a montage of cats pretending to be people, these are all common occurrence in the art of procrastinating. Scrolling through the endless void that is social media, going from one thing to the next can almost feel like time-travel. You pick your phone up at five and only stop because the batteries dead and you discover that Brexit has been finished since you started scrolling.
2. Cleaning – It is funny how the often-unpleasant task of cleaning can be a welcome alternative to a 2000-word essay. Most cleaning (from a recent made-up survey) was found to be done under grounds of being the better alternative. If it was not for procrastination many students across the country would find no time to clean.
3. Binge watching – With streaming services and television now largely OnDemand it allows consumers to get whole series’ available at the touch of a button or a finger. It also makes people ask themselves, one episode? two? three? The answer is always, the whole thing from start to finish. Prime suspects for this are:
i. Friends – 236 episodes, the cult classic follows six ‘friends’ living in New York.
ii. The Big Bang Theory – 279 episodes, the show, much like friends, follows six science geeks and one Penny, the final episode aired in 2019
iii. You – 20 episodes, The Netflix show follows Joe Goldberg in is slightly warped quest to find love and to keep at all costs.
4. Gaming ‒ Xbox, PlayStation, Nintendo, Mobile, PC or other. Why not kick-back, kill some zombies, set some fast laps round a track, create a vibrant bustling world or just be someone else for a time. Everyone plays games, from someone who spends tens of thousands of pounds on a fancy computer right down to someone playing Angry Birds sat on the loo, it is an easy alternative to hard work.
5. Re-arranging furniture ‒ ‘Maybe this table should be over there, but then that chair…’ room Tetris as it should be known as is something that can be done on a whim but turn into a full- blown day of moving chairs, beds and tables around to get the most of a room’s Zen.
6. Cooking ‒ Not everyone can cook, some can… others can serve you undercooked chicken on a bed of sloppy rice. Cooking is something that needs to be done, but when you have to hand in a 40-slide presentation you may feel the urge to cook a three-tiered rainbow cake topped with butterscotch icing, but then you find out you have no eggs so you have to pop out to the shops to get some. So now, finishing the cake at nine in the evening you have got to eat supper and finish your presentation… solution Takeaway.
7. Exercise ‒ Over the weekend, with time to spare the gym hardly looks appealing. However, in the week with work due, it is a home away from home. The gym, your running route or just doing weird yoga positions become things you can suddenly do with out much effort. Why this effort suddenly leaves you when theirs no work to do is a global mystery.
8. Online shopping ‒ If saving money is difficult, spending money is easy peasy lemon squeezy. Who knew that you needed 12 bottles of imported Mountain Dew, or a new bed spread that glows in the dark, you did not before you logged on to amazon but now your basket has ten items in it and you’re looking forward to wearing your Chewbacca onesie with matching Han-Solo replica blaster.
9. Easier work ‒ Why do hard-work when you can do easy work. This work doesn’t require much effort and it’s usually more fun so why not spend four hours on it, despite the fact it should only take 30-minutes. Work smarter not harder… work is work, so milk the easy stuff if you can.
10. Sleep ‒ Doing work can be so tiring, it’s exhausting to even create the effort to go sit at a desk and open a laptop, it is so much easier to grab a blanket, curl up and sleep till ten at night. Yes, this means you have energy and will not sleep till four in the morning, but you are not going to get actual work done, that time is to spend procrastinating… if only there was a helpful list to suggest what you can do.