Procrastination
Content Courtesy of the Forever Young Podcast with Christiana Egi and Cherrie-Marie Chiu.
Have you been putting off some things that you know you should be doing? On this episode of the Forever Young Podcast, we discussed procrastination, and how to best avoid it in our day-to-day lives and have a more productive day! The main driving force behind procrastination is that people are afraid of failure. So, if you don't want to fail or you don't think you're doing well, this hinders you from getting it done at all.
Procrastination is the act of delaying or postponing something we need to do. Most of us are guilty of this, but procrastination is not the same thing as laziness. On the contrary, procrastination can result from having too much on your plate. Procrastination can lead to feeling stressed and frustrated, and it is a bad habit to break.
To stop procrastinating, we must first understand why we procrastinate. There are four to six types of procrastinators. We decided to merge four different types, from two different schools of thought. Here are the four types of procrastinators.
The first is the performer of "plenty of time" procrastinator. These individuals often perform at high levels and claim to love to work under pressure. Unfortunately, they always take on more than they can handle, which can cause stress and the inability to complete their tasks. This may be a lot of students, who leave things for the last minute. However, as a student, if you find yourself procrastinating, have yourself a deadline before the actual deadline. Having an accountability partner can also be helpful to hold you to your tasks and help you avoid thinking there is enough time to complete your tasks.
The second type of procrastinator is the self-deprecating/perfectionist. Perfectionists can sometimes get in their own way. This can be because they set such a high standard for themselves which they cannot often meet. They can get overwhelmed by fear of failure, and they can start being self-deprecating. The first thing is to not be so hard on yourself, and admit when you're tired, and you need a break. If you find yourself in this category of always needing things to be perfect, try to take a step back and understand that things do not always need to be perfect. If you make a mistake, it is not the end of the world, and you can move forward from it.
The third one is the Over Booker and Anxious procrastinator. These are the people that lack time management skills, they tend to take much more than they can handle, but they can't really finish what they have. If you find yourself in this category and find yourself constantly with a fully booked calendar, try to set off free time on your calendar for play and relaxation. This can help reduce your anxiety and help you get your tasks done.
The next type of procrastinator is the novelty seeker / the fun procrastinator. People in this category are said to be never satisfied, and if your tasks don’t help satisfy you, you move on to the next thing. If you fall into this category, you can overcome this habit by creating to-do lists. This way, even if you skip a project on your to-do list, you still know that you have it on your list, and you can keep track of it and go back to it. To-do lists can help you stay on track and make sure to get what you need to get done.
The last type of procrastinator we discussed was revenge-sleep procrastination. This is where you sacrifice sleep for relaxation at the end of the day, or to complete other tasks. This is a very unhealthy habit that can lead to an unhealthy sleep pattern and affect your productivity throughout the day.
Some of the negative impacts that can result from revenge-sleep procrastination. Revenge-sleep procrastination can lead to feeling tired during the day, difficulty concentrating, irritability, high blood pressure, diabetes, heart attacks, heart failure, and obesity. It could also lead to impaired memory, depression, impaired immunity, premature aging, a lower sex drive, lower quality of life, relationship challenges, and more.
So there's really nothing more precious than having healthy sleep hygiene. If you're not getting proper sleep, you are not getting what your body requires to be healthy and functioning during the day. People often overlook sleep as not an essential part of their health. If you listen to our podcasts on sleep or do any research of your own, you'll find that sleep is in fact critical to our health. Our past episode "sleeping for health" discusses many tips and will help you learn a lot about the importance of sleep.
Habits are difficult to break. However, when you are faced with ones that have so many health repercussions, like procrastination, we do need to work towards finding a way around it.
If you find yourself being a procrastinator, just know that many of us fall into that category as we are not perfect. However, we can try to incorporate good habits to combat our bad ones. Figuring out what helps you procrastinate less, whether that may be having fewer distractions, waking up early, or making to-do lists can do wonders to the quality of your own life and well-being. The most important thing is to learn to be compassionate toward yourself. We all make mistakes as humans, but it is important to rise above them and move forward.
The Forever Young podcast is created and produced by Christiana Egi and Cherrie Marie Chiu. Produced and engineered by Elisse Hill. The podcast represents our opinions and those of our guests. The content should not be taken as medical advice. It is for informational purposes only. Please consult your healthcare professional for any medical questions. If you like our show, please tell your friends and leave a five-star review on Apple Podcasts. New episodes are available every other Wednesday. Have questions? Email us at ourforeveryoungpodcast@gmail.com.
