Time speeds up, sweat drips down, heart pounds as the finishing touches are added to the page minutes before it is due to be turned in. Waiting until the last minute to start and finish something can be one of the most stressful aspects of education.

   Procrastination is a very unhealthy and dangerous habit that many children and adults have to overcome. It can cause a failed grade on an important project, or an unsuccessful meeting because of lack of facts and statistics. It overall can have a very deep impact on your life and those around you.

   “Procrastination is a sign of laziness and uncareful attitude, and is very bad for character development and is an obstacle for preparing for the future and competitive job fields as an adult,” sophomore Barrett Soriano said. “A manager will almost always pick the applicant with the better work ethic over one who procrastinates.”

    Many people put their jobs and careers in jeopardy because the act of waiting until the very last moment to do something has gotten out of control.  

   “For some people it can be like an adrenaline rush,” Collin Hill said. “It feels really good at the time, but it hurts in the end and never seems to pay off the way people might think it does.”

Many procrastinators lie to themselves. Statements such as “Working under pressure brings out the best in me” is an example of this. In reality, however, most of these people do not work best under pressure, but just tell themselves a phony excuse to convince themselves not to do it at that moment, but just do it right before the deadline hits.

   “I struggle with procrastination myself and I understand that it isn’t the right way to do things,” Soriano said. “I always tell myself that I can just do it later and that there will be plenty of time to do it at another moment, but I just never find myself actually working on whatever it happens to be whenever I say that I will. I know it is a problem, I just choose not to fix it. It is a mental battle that I have to fight hard to win.”