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Opinion

Putting it off a valuable lesson

James Davis
Opinion Columnist

In a university as diverse as UH, it's encouraging to know the vast majority of us have something in common. Black, white, Republican, Libertarian, Jewish, Hindu, 4.0 grade-point averages to 2.0 -- we are all procrastinators.

And we take a certain pride in it. Ask your friends if they procrastinate; the answer will probably be a hearty "hell, yeah." On Facebook.com, that definitive guide to college social dynamics, the most populated group by far is Procrastinators of the University of Houston, with a whopping 2,595 members. (I was going to determine a percentage based off the total number of Facebook accounts. Guess why I didn't … ) That's 929 more than College Would Be Awesome If I Didn't Have To Go To Class and 1,004 more than Naptime Should Be a Course In College, which both evoke the same idea: We don't want to work. We will avoid work until we have to stay up all night to finish it, and even then, we call the people who finish it ambitious. 

It's not perfect, but it's popular, and trying to stop it is an exercise in futility. In fact, we may benefit from this phenomenon more than any of us may realize. Sure, the result might have been better if you had spread the work out over a longer stretch of time, but there is something to be said about working under pressure, even if that pressure is self-imposed.

Those of us who have taken a literature course know how daunting the reading load can be. We also know, then, that this reading becomes even more intimidating when it's a week before a test over three novels and we haven't read a single page. 

Of course, we'd be better off had we started earlier, but when we have to plow through this much material, our reading skills improve. We learn to read quickly, to look for the essential and to analyze content while moving forward in plot. Providing the work is completed at one point or another, procrastination forces us to work in a condensed timeframe. It challenges us and gives us a more accurate gauge of our abilities.

How many of you have ever taken a WebCT quiz an hour or less before it was due? Your professors will chide such behavior, but working under this pressure is much more realistic than having hours to complete 20 questions, with multiple chances to retry. These are exactly the stressful circumstances you'll encounter when you take your graduate school entrance exams. The GRE math portion is much more difficult than your College Algebra quizzes, and you'll have much less time to complete it. Don't think of it as procrastination; think of it as practice.

The same is even truer for writing. We feel foolish when we stay up until 4 a.m. to write a paper we've known about for weeks, but foolish or not, writing under pressure is a reality for professional writers, especially journalists. If you're reviewing a play at 8 p.m. and the story comes out the next morning, you won't have time for rough drafts. 

Knowing how to structure an argument quickly, simply and forcefully is an invaluable asset to any writer, and it's something you practice every time you put a paper off until the last minute. Starting ahead of time helps when you can, but in the real world, you usually don't have this luxury.

So why beat yourself up over procrastination? Studies show nervousness and anxiety over putting off work is actually counterproductive. According to Fiore (1989), the best solution to procrastination is to acknowledge one's worth isn't based solely off one assignment. Unrealistic, nervous fears perpetuate procrastination, whereas relaxed, matter-of-fact assessments encourage production. Instead of "I must do well," tell yourself, "I'll do OK in time." Instead of "I have no time to play," tell yourself, "It's important that I play for an hour." Obsessing over your lack of time only fans the flames.

So relax. If you have an assignment due tomorrow that you just started today, keep in mind that you are surrounded by people in the same predicament. And take pride in yourself. You've done it before, and you can do it again.

Davis, an opinion columnist for The Daily Cougar, 
can be reached at jpdavis@uh.edu.