How to Stop Procrastinating

So it’s January, that time of the year when we make unattainable promises to ourselves in the hope that this year will be a life-changing year. Whether it’s exercising more, studying harder or drinking less we all have extreme visions of what we’ll be like – fit, intelligent, sober machines – just a couple of months into the new year. We all have such good intentions for our future selves that it’s hard to understand why much of what we promise ourselves never happens the way we planned. 

Statistics tell us that just 8% of New Year’s resolutions are successful yet we still continue to make them, confident in our future self’s ability to change. So why do we often end up making the same promises every year? One answer would be that we are all perpetual procrastinators. The future is one place where anything can get done – a 3,000 word essay on a Sunday morning? Easy. A light jog at 6am before a lecture? Sure. No kebabs ever again on nights out? Simple! You don’t even like kebabs! But when it comes down to it, present choices are never so good. After all, isn’t it easier to bodge the essay, sleep an extra 30 minutes and not have to go to the supermarket for salad? We’ll do all that next week, right? Wrong.

The link between New Year’s resolutions and procrastination is a stronger one than you might think. In the same way New Year’s resolutions are made in a mindset of pure ambition for the future, procrastination also sees tomorrow as a mystical place where any amount of work and exercise, along with everything else, can be done.

The (easier said than done) solution is to counter your need for instant gratification by outsmarting your base human instincts. In You Are Not So Smart, a book analyzing the human condition and the way we commandeer our lives, David McRaney writes about how to stop procrastinating. “In the struggle between should versus want, some people have figured out something crucial – want never goes away. Procrastination is all about choosing want over should because you don’t have a plan for those times when you can expect to be tempted. You are really bad at predicting your future mental states. In addition, you are terrible at choosing between now or later.” This understanding of our own human weakness is vital for understanding why we procrastinate and therefore how we can stop doing so much of it.

In a study conducted in 2002 by Dan Ariely and Klaus Wertenbroch, students of three different classes were given the task of completing three essays in three weeks. Class A were to hand in all three essays on the final day, class B could pick three different deadlines for each essay but had to stick with those dates, and class C were required to hand in one essay each week. The results showed that class C, with three deadlines equal amounts of time apart, did the best. Class B, the class which had the freedom to choose their own dates, came second and most tellingly class A, the class given the most amount of time, did the worst.

The experiment shows that although rational thought might tell you to opt for maximum time to submit all three essays, this is not the best choice as there is no bind to ensure students make use of the entire three weeks given. Most students in class B realized the benefits of equally distributing the essays – those in tune with their own tendencies to procrastinate – but the overall grade was brought down by those students who had chosen also to submit at the last minute. Those were the ones who didn’t recognize in themselves their propensity to procrastinate and were too confident in their ability to self-regulate.