After binging a whole season of your favourite TV show, you check the time and notice that it’s 11:30pm. Your essay is due at midnight, and it currently has a singular line that consists of your name. You know you should have begun writing it a while ago. You know that you should probably start writing it while you still have thirty minutes. But suddenly, you find your finger hitting the “Next Episode” button, and you’re sucked into the riveting world of zombie apocalypses and alien takeovers, dramatically romantic trips to Paris, and coloured unicorns defeating other magical creatures with the power of friendship.

It’s okay though. The episode is short – only 25 minutes. The remaining 5 minutes should be enough to write a 5000-word essay on the true meaning of life.

…right?

We’ve all been through the awful realization that we haven’t left ourselves enough time to complete whatever tasks we’ve put off. But despite swearing to never procrastinate again, many of us remain in the cycle of leaving things to the very last minute anyway.

So why do we do this? Procrastination is detrimental to the quality of our work, our mental health, and can even cause anxiety.

Here we will break down five reasons for procrastination, as well as how to finally stop the cycle.

1. You’re overwhelmed

Staring at a task (or many) can seem very daunting, especially if it’s new to you or not your forte.  However, having to do these kinds of tasks is inevitable. It is important to break out of your deer-in-the-headlights pose and just… start.

A way we can overcome being overwhelmed by tasks is to use the 5-Minute Rule. This rule is simply to set a five minute timer and try to focus on your task until the timer rings. If it’s truly that terrifying, move on to something else and try it again in a bit. But most of the time, five minutes is the perfect excuse for us dive in the task headfirst.

It’s only five minutes, right?

2. Boredom

Nobody likes doing things they find bland and mundane. It’s easy to do something more interesting (watching magical rainbow ponies) over something a little less fun (writing a multi-paged essay about the meaning of life). However, sometimes the mundane task is more important, and therefore putting it off has pretty negative effects.

The solution? Make it enjoyable.

It might sound stupid, difficult, or even impossible to make something as dull as essay writing fun and engaging. But it’s not actually that hard. Try to find something positive about the task that you might enjoy.

If you like games, challenge yourself to finish it within a certain time frame. Game-ify everything. Split the task up into levels and turn on some fast paced music. How many chores can you finish within fifteen minutes? Can you beat your high score from last time?

If you’re a daydreamer, attempt to romanticize what you’re doing. Watch yourself from a third person perspective and make what you’re doing seem rosy and interesting. Sometimes just imagining having fun is enough to push yourself into doing the task.

Try to tailor the task into something fun and interesting, whatever that may look like for you. We tend to be more welcoming to tasks that we find more engaging.

3. Perfectionism-Procrastination

It doesn’t seem like a very likely cause of procrastination – in fact, wouldn’t a perfectionist want as much time as they can get in order to do a task to the best of their ability?

In reality, perfectionism is one of the most common underlying reasons for procrastination. Perfectionists tend to spend an obnoxious time in the planning phase for the “grand scheme”. Extreme organization is one of the most common examples of spending too long planning. This often looks like spending a lot of time rewriting and colour coding notes, creating schedules, and making complex lists of everything that needs to be accomplished. While organization is important, over-organization is a form of subtler procrastination that is difficult to overcome.

To combat perfectionism-procrastination, we can try to set more achievable goals. It’s critical that we recognize that it’s not realistic to do everything perfectly. Trying to show ourselves compassion and understanding is important. Instead of trying to do everything to the utmost of our abilities, perhaps picking just a parts to do as well as you can is more realistic. It doesn’t have to be the best, or the shiniest, or the most put together.

It just needs to be done.

4. Distraction

Why would anybody ever choose to study the differences between potential and kinetic energy when their favourite automotive forum is causing their phone to have a seizure? Especially with the rapid evolution of social media and technology generally, there are more distractions than ever. But despite the interesting debate between manual transmission and automatic transmission, you still need to study.

The solution to distractions is simply just to remove them. Change your notification settings to DND (do not disturb), switch the ringer off, chuck your phone down the stairs (don’t actually do that). Draw the curtains closed around the window. Close the door. Play some lofi beats and try to focus on your task.

5. Burnout Fatigue

Burnout is so easy to fall into, especially as youth. Ambition fills us, and all of a sudden we want to do everything with seemingly endless determination and stamina. Eight hours of sleep? Ha! Who needs to spend a whole third of their lives sleeping when coffee exists?

Spoiler alert: the determination and stamina are not endless, and eight cups of coffee are a poor substitute for hours of sleep that you missed. The fatigue catches up so fast, and afterward it can seem that focusing on anything just seems somehow even more exhausting. Therefore, we’ll just do it “later”, when we have enough energy. “Later” tends to be a few moments before the deadline, and then we’re burnt out again in the time crunch to finish. Tada! We’re stuck in a vicious cycle.

The easiest way to avoid burnout fatigue is just to avoid burnout. Set realistic goals for yourself, pace your work, and try to maintain your health both physically and mentally. Check in with yourself periodically for signs of burnout.

However, sometimes burnout is inevitable, especially as a student. So how can we deal with it if we’re already burnt out?

While there isn’t a perfect solution to continuing work during burnout, some things that can help are to split up your work and to add mindfulness periodically  throughout your day. Try to give yourself small breaks in order to recuperate and give yourself enough energy to continue. Do your best to prioritize your health; burning out more will only make everything more difficult.

TLDR;

Procrastinating can stop us from doing important tasks. Some reasons for procrastination might include overwhelment, boredom, perfectionism, distractions, and burnout. We can help ourselves focus and avoid procrastination with a multitude of strategies, including removing distractions and the 5 Minute Rule.

If you’re here, you’re probably procrastinating by reading this entire article about procrastination. So use this as a reminder to go do whatever it is that you’re putting off! Try to use the strategies we’ve discussed. You might be surprised at how fast you can finish!