Procrastinitis

A sad affliction, and yet, I revel in it.

I got my acceptance e-mail from U of Birmingham in the U.K. for their History, Film and Television MA (yes, we now live in a world where the "large envelope" has been replaced with a "looks-like-spam-I-almost-missed-it" email). This is, of course, fantastic news, but there's still so much to consider. I've yet to complete my applications to Northwestern and Central Michigan, and, if all goes according to plan and I get accepted, the whole decision is basically going to come down to money. The good old weak-ass American dollar -- which, in my bank account, almost all of it is loan money which needs to be paid back. A sad state of affairs, in which important decisions possibly determining the course of my life must come down to how much debt I'm willing to rack up.

Alas, I digress.

The topic of this post is procrastination. It is true that I have no less than 5 major tasks to complete before the end of my last semester of my undergraduate degree. A group project (crafting a wiki) for Social Media, a presentation/7-10 pg research paper for the same class. A daunting 10-pg paper for my history class, which I'm sure will be atrocious since I have no idea what to write about (that, and the fact that my teacher fails any paper he can cut down by 1/3 or more.) My short film which is serving as my senior project. And a final group project for my Broadcast Studio class. Oh, and final exams.

And what am I doing?

Blogging. Reading Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. Watching TV. Trolling Twitter. Sleeping.

This happens every single semester. It has never failed. I have reached the point in the semester when the quality of work no longer matters to me, it's the mere fact of getting it done that motivates me. I start out as a quasi-perfectionist, and my work slowly decreases in quality until the end of November, where I figuratively "throw in the towel" much too early.

I rarely complain about the time frames for assignments, because I know that my time management skills are horrific. With the exception of the history paper, none of my assignments are particularly difficult or unreasonable. I just hit this wall where productivity dips into the negative values. Even my usually rampant creative juices just evaporate.

If only there were some magic pill I could take that would suddenly burn the desire to succeed into my soul.

I know I am not alone, and that gives me hope. Hope that this disease will someday be eradicated, that we may live in a perfect world where all students get their work done in plenty of time, have no fun, and don't like to party and rot their brains with television.

If only.