How to: Procrastinate

pro·cras·ti·nate: delay or postpone action; put off doing something.

A skill necessary for every high school student. You know that list of stuff you have to get done by tomorrow? Yeah, it is important, but you don’t have to do it right this second.

Once you get out of school, no matter how much work you have to do, talk with your friends. You’re in no rush. When you arrive home, eat some food. Not just a snack, a full-on meal. You deserve it. You just made it through another day of school. You’ve been needing to do laundry forever. This needs to happen immediately. So do your laundry. Now that you’ve accomplished something, reward yourself. Check social media. Read Facebook, tweet that funny thing you’ve been meaning to tweet for a while. Clean your room. A messy room is a cause for a messy brain. Reminisce through all those things and papers that you’ve kept from forever ago. Now it’s about time you put your laundry in the dryer. After that, you remember that you tweeted something. See how many retweets it has.

You really should start getting that paper that is due tomorrow done. Make a list of all the things you have to get done. Realize that there has to be an app for this kind of thing, or at least a better one. Right? Research to-do list apps.

Now that you’ve got the perfect list, made in the new app of yours, you deserve a nap. You’ve accomplished a lot. Okay, that’s probably not true. But you’ll write a better paper if you are not tired. So take that nap. Once you wake up and realize how many hours have passed, text your friends. Tell them how you’re procrastinating, and you really do need to get that paper done. It’s due tomorrow! You haven’t even started!

Go to your computer and open up Microsoft word. Write your name, a title, and stare at the blank canvas in front of you. Ponder what you’re going to write. Maybe turn on some music to get those creative juices flowing. After you’ve pondered for awhile, you’re probably ready to just give up, and you want to just go to bed. Analyze if you go to bed right now, what time would you have to wake up in order to write this paper? Go to the bed, and just hope for the best. Maybe you’ll get around to hanging up your clothes tomorrow. (A procrastinator’s favorite word)