Writing Process

My Writing Process: Procrastination

I am a terrible procrastinator. I feel like it is not something I do by conscious choice, yet every time I have to write a paper, I am working at the last minute. This is true for any type of writing assignment I have to do– academic papers, blogs, poetry, responses – even writing assignments that are meant to be fun! The worst time I procrastinated was last year when I had to write a paper for a geography class. The assignment was on the syllabus (in other words, I knew about the paper on the first day of class) and wasn’t due until April. However, at nine o’clock the night before the paper was due, I was just starting to make my outline and then I had to wake up a few hours early to edit the paper so that I could turn it in on time. I really hate procrastination and the feeling of having something hanging over my head; it is stressful and does not help for the production of a good quality assignment. I think it comes down to the fact that I am easily distracted and do not have a very good perception of time; I always feel like I have more time than what is really there. Procrastination is something that I have always struggled with and as this is my last semester in college (as an undergraduate, at least) I want to do my best to discontinue this bad habit.

Speaking of being easily distracted, in August, I was diagnosed with attention deficit disorder (ADD) and an information-processing learning disability, which basically means that it takes me a little longer to understand concepts and get started on things. I thought it was ridiculous that my doctor and parents thought that I should be tested for it in the first place, because I was twenty-one and thought, isn’t that something that you should know about when you’re a kid? And anyway, doesn’t everyone procrastinate and have difficulty taking tests in the allotted time? Apparently not. I’m glad that I found out about these issues though; it is helpful to know what I need to do in order to get my work done efficiently and on time. For example, I started taking medication to help with concentration, and I am able to do my homework in distraction-free settings. It has helped with the procrastination problem a bit since my lack of concentration unfortunately aids my procrastination process; I can get my work done, but I have to actually start the work in the first place.

Since I am so easily sidetracked, another thing I have tried is to take my work to a new setting that is as distraction-free as possible. This helps with the procrastination somewhat, but not enough to produce a paper during that one writing session. Of course, Peter Elbow would say that it takes more than just one writing session to write a paper; in his chapter on Growing from Writing Without Teachers, Elbow says that you should use a writing technique where you start with a four-hour block of time and alternate between forty five minute freewriting periods and fifteen minutes of reading and editing. However, I usually don’t have time to designate the first four hours to start generating ideas when I am working at the last minute.

A technique I have used to avoid procrastination is made lists of all the schoolwork I have to do for the day, which include time slots for each task. For example, I give myself one hour for one assignment, three hours for another assignment, and so on. This way, if I have a paper to write, I can schedule it in for a few hours each day. The problem with writing these lists is that I don’t stick to them and have to spend more time planning out a new list. I also waste too much time on them; instead of jotting down the obligations onto a scrap of paper, I unnecessarily spend time color-coordinating and making the lists nice and neat. Ironically, making lists for myself turned out to be a technique that aided my procrastination process, which was not the goal I was aiming for.

I think a big part of my procrastination problem is that I can be very unmotivated when it comes to writing papers. This could be a result of several things, for example, lack of sleep, dislike of the subject or just not wanting to do it. But most of the time, I think I am unmotivated because it can be hard to see the end of the process (for instance, when I have a big research paper to write), so I put off getting started on it as long as I can to avoid dealing with it. Of course, there are many ways to get motivated to write as well, like wanting to achieve a good grade in a class or just get the process of writing the paper over with. On the other hand, it is so much easier to motivate myself to do something that is not necessary at the time (but needs to get done eventually) like cleaning, which is one of my least favorite things to do – I honestly do not think that my apartment is cleaner than when I have a paper to write.

Procrastination is terrible habit to get into, and one that is very hard to get out of. I think it is one of those things that you just have to do – not going around the problem or planning on stopping it – but just deciding to stop and actually sticking to it. If I learn to stop procrastinating then I think that I will actually have more time to do other things to get ahead in my classes, like reading ahead and outlining the upcoming chapters my textbooks (which is something that I should probably be doing anyway). I also know that I will be a lot happier once I actually learn to just sit down and get my work done because then I will not be so anxious when the due dates start creeping up on me, and I believe that the overall quality of my work will improve as well.

Word Count: 1,056

This entry was posted on Sunday, February 24th, 2008 at 2:40 pm and is filed under Final Papers. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.