Welcome to Part 3 in Gaetano’s series on procrastination. We know the causes. Time to talk about the effects.

Procrastination Mini-Series – Effects

by Gaetano Caruana

Procrastination seems to be fun to do at first but it won’t take long until the procrastinator feels the effects of his/her choice. Procrastination has devastating effects on the person who does it and is completely not worth it. In this part of the procrastination mini-series, I am going to highly some of the procrastination effects, with the hope of making you more aware about procrastination and motivate you to avoid it or work hard to beat it.

Sense of guilt: Even though it is you who choose to procrastinate, you still feel guilty for doing it. The fact that you waste time instead of getting things done makes you feel bad with yourself. Even though, with a lot of effort and working extreme hours, you manage to make it by the deadline of a particular task, you will still feel guilty. This is because you will have doubts whether you could have produced something of better quality if you made good use of your time.

Become a liar: In today’s world nobody works alone. Everyone is part of a team and every team member depends on other members. The fact that you procrastinate and fall behind schedules makes you feel bad, since you keep back the whole team with you. When asked to give reasons for the delays, you start lying to find excuses to cover up your procrastination problem.

Prone to other vices: A study conducted by Fuschia Sirois and Timothy Pychyl of Carleton University, clearly shows that procrastinators are more prone to start other vices such as smoking or abusing alcohol. Starting new vices will further make it difficult for you to stop procrastinating and will further make your life miserable

Health Problems: Living a procrastinator life is not easy! Procrastination has both psychological and physical effects. The same study by Fuschia Sirois and Timothy Pychyl shows that college students that procrastinate in their schoolwork are more likely to have health problems such as suffering from insomnia, diet and exercise problems

Gaetano Caruana writes for the FruitfulTime Blog, where you’ll find the free ebook Stop Procrastination Now.

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Thanks, Gaetano!

–ME “Liz” Strauss