What's Your Excuse for Being a Masochist?

Summer has ended. Time to start going to sleep before sunrise. Time to get focused. Every year there is the same buzz on the first day of school. New school clothes, supplies, and new teachers. The chance to make a fresh new start once again. So why do so few of us take this opportunity to get on track? We all say, "This years going to be different, I'm going to keep my grades up. And above all..."I am absolutely not going to PROCRASTINATE!!!!" Then we get assigned an essay and we rationalize procrastinating by thinking, "Well I'll wait until tomorrow, I have to much to do today, but tomorrow I'll finish my rough draft. It's not due for a week anyways." Three hours later, we are on myspace, facebook, watching t.v., or using some other avoidance tactic of choice. (I have even heard of some Franklin IB students choosing to clean rather that do their work.) The next day we are assigned another project that happens to be due on the same day as our essay. Days pass and our teachers knowingly ask us whether we have started on our essays and we coyly mumble in response. The day before the essay is due, we beg for an extension claiming, "We have a test and another project due that day." and innocently adding that, "It's the beginning of the year." When the teacher finally gives in to our relentless begging stating, "Well, I suppose I'll pity you just this once since you do have a test and it's the beginning of the year but don't expect it to happen again." We, of cours,e follow the same pattern and wait until the day before the essay is due to do it. When we turn it in we vow that we will never procrastinate again. But we, for some reason, forget that vow two weeks later when we are assigned another project. We are supposed to be Risk -Takers but I'm certain they didn't mean risk the chance of your grade falling in to the depths of despair because you wouldn't get focused and do the whatever-project- you-were-assigned when it was assigned. We are supposed to be reflective, this means when we figure out that procrastinating makes our lives hell and that we are the ones making IB more stressful than it needs to be, we need to fix it not fall into the same pattern year after year. So, I'm going to journey into uncharted territory and start and finish the year not procrastinating. I'll be blogging about my experiences as a non-procrastinator, better yet my experiences as an IB student who has decided to take action, which is the antonym for procrastination. I think Mrs. Theile would say that wording it that way will lead me to success because I'm focusing on what I need to do not what I don't need to do. So what do say, will you try to avoid the road to becoming a masochist with me?