What is procrastination?

Procrastination means replacing important tasks – which you feel you ought to do – with activities that are more enjoyable or easier in the short term.
For example, instead of doing study-related activities, you end up scrolling through social media, watching a series on Netflix or playing video games.

Everyone procrastinates from time to time, especially when there’s something on the agenda that we find tedious or difficult.
But procrastination can also become a (persistent) habit that causes stress and, as a result, can affect your studies

An overview of the pitfalls of procrastination (image)
Test to see if you’re a procrastinator (website)

Procrastination is not laziness:

• a lazy person enjoys doing nothing without any stress.
• Someone who procrastinates actually wants to do the task, but just can’t manage it at that moment. This leads to feelings of guilt. As a result, you don’t really enjoy your free time.

Read: Laziness versus procrastination: what’s the difference? (website)
Procrastination versus doing nothing at a glance (image)

Procrastination often follows a fixed, frustrating pattern:

• Calm: At first, you have plenty of time. You feel no pressure and enjoy your freedom.
• Procrastination: The deadline is approaching. You know you have to get started, but you don’t feel like it yet.
• Distraction: You start cleaning, scrolling, checking emails… to avoid the task. You always find an excuse to put off actually starting until tomorrow.
• Panic: Time is almost up. Now you have no choice but to get on with it. The stress means you can suddenly work for hours on end.
• Resolution: You just managed to finish on time. Exhausted, you vow: “Next time I’ll start on time!”
• Repetition: Unfortunately, with the next assignment, you fall into the same trap all over again.

A procrastinator talks about his cycle of procrastination (video, 14')
The 6 stages of procrastination (infographic)
7 common student procrastination excuses (website)

Not all procrastination is bad. Sometimes taking a short break is the smartest choice.

• Functional procrastination

Sometimes procrastination is entirely justified. You deliberately put off a task because the circumstances aren’t right at the moment – and that’s perfectly fine.

- Do you have a severe headache? Then waiting until tomorrow to study is sometimes the smartest decision.
- Stuck on a difficult exercise? Put it aside for a moment. Looking at it with fresh eyes the next day often reveals the solution surprisingly quickly.

• Dysfunctional procrastination

Procrastination becomes a problem when you keep putting off tasks you really need to do, time and time again, even when you have the will and motivation to get started.
You promise yourself you'll do it time and time again, but you still can’t bring yourself to start. In the long run, this has unpleasant consequences:

- missing deadlines
- meeting deadlines by the skin of your teeth under immense stress
- not being able to study everything thoroughly