It’s the middle of midterm season, I’m drowning in a sea of loose papers and textbooks, and Teen Wolf is on TV. Despite all of this, I’m still going to pause it all so I can tell you guys how to stay on track.
Pretty generous, I know.
In all seriousness, it could just be me (though I’m pretty sure it’s not), but this semester seems almost twice as busy as the last. Everyone I talk to seems swamped – waist-deep – with schoolwork, and it can definitely be difficult to find encouragement when you feel trapped by your workload.
The dark side may have cookies, but the Internet has Facebook, Tumblr AND Netflix waiting for you.
So, for those of us that are experts of the Web, but are still motivationally-challenged, I present to you three ways to beat your procrastination issues:
This extension is available to almost all types of browsers (yes, even those of you on Internet Explorer). It blocks websites (of your choice) for a specified amount of time so you can focus only what is absolutely necessary – that you hand your paper before that 9am deadline. I can’t even recall how many times this has helped me in the past.
A lot of people gawk at me when I say I read better with music playing, but I’m sure I’m not the only one. For those of you that are musically inclined but know how much time/effort making a ‘study’ playlist takes, here’s a website with pre-made playlists that are based largely on moods. Hit ‘Explore’ and type in ‘study’ + whatever genre floats your boat, and voila! You’re good to go.
Someone in high school suggested this to me. In the simplest terms, The Pomodoro Technique breaks up your time so that you can a) work efficiently and b) prevent a burnout from happening. This particular method suggests creating time slots of 25 minutes in which you work intensely, then take a short break, and then resume your next 25 minutes of productivity. Reminder: your ‘short break’ should ideally be less than 25 minutes long.
And as a special bonus…
Go get ‘em, tiger!