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Latwell Nyangu-Youth Interactive Writer

College students seem especially adept at procrastination.

And this has seen many students being victims of academic failures.

Procrastination is still the thief of time.

Life as students often leaves us standing bare, naked, and dejected with lost opportunities. The tide in the affairs of students does not remain at the flood, it ebbs.

We may cry out desperately for time to pause but time is deaf to every plea and rushes on.

As said, over the bleached bones and jumbled residue of numerous human kind are written the pathetic words: ‘Too late.’ There is an invisible book of life that faithfully records our vigilance or our neglect as students. As students, we are now faced with the fact that tomorrow is today and we tend not to worry about tomorrow.

Probably, some of the students have adopted the bible verse in Matthew 6:34 that says, “Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.” In this context, students seem to be more worried about TODAY than tomorrow and put aside all the academic tasks.

As a result, many of them have become party animals, too playful, relaxed and only think of seriousness at the last minute, which mostly is a costly stance.

We are confronted with the fierce urgency of  “now”, as students. In this unfolding conundrum of life and history, there is such a thing as being too late.

The ‘I will do’ syndrome is something that as students we have inherited; I don’t know from who?

Procrastination is the grave in which many opportunities are buried. There is nothing so fatal to character as half-finished tasks. How soon ‘not now’ becomes ‘never’.

A perfect method for adding drama to a student’s life is to wait until the deadline looms.

I always laugh at one fellow student who completed a whole semester saying that his assignment was in his laptop and it only needed to be printed. Surprisingly, the semester came to an end before he even submitted it. He kept on insisting that he would print it in no time.

Until now, I don’t know if he printed and submitted the assignment. And at my workplace, we had a student on attachment One day he left the newsroom and promised to send his story to the news editor.

He promised that the story would be sent soon since he was writing it on his phone, but up to now he has not yet submitted  the story.

And we are still expecting it! Worse still, since that day, he never came back to the work station. We call him a ‘legend’.

But sadly, he made a ‘Lazarus’ moment months later, when he came holding his assessment forms and the consequences were dire, as he had nothing to show for his work. He cried as his life was on a knife edge.

That’s the result of procrastination. All these are true stories and it’s all in the name of procrastination. There are many victims of this syndrome and there will be more future casualties.

Where did we inherit procrastination, my fellow students? College life has buried many victims.

Some have failed to write exams, some dropped out of school, some squandered tuition or exam fees, some have deferred, some have failed course work, dissertations among many tasks.

It has become a cliché that many students have become the ‘last minute’ culprits and many of us are still recounting this experience which many times has cost us.

While many students would want to give some justification to their procrastination, there is nothing to sell from delays.

This disease is prevalent among students, which can take various forms, and leads to a range of issues, including worse grades, worse career prospects, and increased stress.

As students, we procrastinate due to at times exhaustion and anxiety outweigh our self-control and motivation.

Many students have lost direction due to procrastination since it can restrict one’s potential and undermine their careers. It can also disrupt teamwork, reduce morale, and even lead to depression and job loss.

So, it’s crucial to take proactive steps to prevent it. The first step to overcome procrastination is to recognise that you are doing it.

It is reported procrastination causes lower quality papers and projects, lower exams scores and to a lesser extent, late or missing assignments. While, some argue that procrastination is associated with laziness or lack of self-control, there are many reasons which might include, lack of focus, poverty, bad behaviour among others.

The phrase that procrastination is the thief of time denotes that procrastinating—postponing things unnecessarily—causes people to waste a lot of their time.

This saying is meant to encourage people to take action in a timely manner, instead of delaying.

Results of data analysis revealed that indecision, time management, lack of motivation, fear of failure, poor organisational skills, high stress, poor coping strategies and peer influence, in that descending order of importance or priority, were considered by participants as causes for their academic procrastination.

Victims of procrastination suffer from abstract goals, outcomes that are far in the future, a disconnect from our future self, feeling overwhelmed, anxiety and task aversion.

Fellow students when you procrastinate, you don’t make decisions within your control. It is the subconscious mind asking you to delay the task. It is a disadvantage to procrastinate as you lose your focus and concentration, this also reduces interest in activities.

Procrastination leads to mental fatigue and eventually causes depression since many times you will be the last to finish a task at hand. 

I have noted that as students, we procrastinate to meet the deadlines which leads to failing to complete a task within the specified time forcing us to submit shoddy work.

Procrastinating to prepare for exams has also cost many students to attain better grades for themselves.

The results of procrastinating include being overwhelmed and anything that is done in a rush, produces unattractive results.

Procrastination is the thief of time!