Humor: Focus tips for the average college procrastinator

Parker Murray

Focusing is hard for everyone. In a world with seemingly endless distractions, it can be a real challenge to focus on the task at hand. Lucky for you, reader, I am an expert at focusing and I have eight tips to help pull you to finish anything.

Tip 1: Keep Netflix on when you do homework. Studies have shown that people are great at multitasking and contrary to what your mother might say, people can, in fact, binge-watch TV while they work. Plus, you haven’t watched season four of “House of Cards” yet, and what better show to write a paper to than an intense political drama that requires extreme attentiveness?

Tip 2: Text all of your friends before you start your projects. After you text all of your friends and start talking to them, they can give you the encouragement to finish your work. Encouragement is the caffeine of productivity, plus, you can talk about the season of “House of Cards” you just finished.

Tip 3: Stay up as long as you need to finish your work. It’s a real myth that you work better after a full night’s sleep, and why do tomorrow morning what you can do tonight? Plus, how else can people know how hard you work if you don’t constantly pull all-nighters?

Tip 4: Tweet about the work that you’re doing. You’re doing homework, you’re studying for an exam, you’re writing a paper — it’s best to promise your 132 followers on Twitter that you will finish this homework. The bond that you and your Twitter followers have is a sacred, unbreakable bond.

Tip 5: Stress-eat your feelings away. Stress eating: we all do it, we all love it. What better way to fuel up for the paper you’re writing then to go to Taco Bell, get the taco party pack, and eat all of it before you get home? According to the Center of Attentivity and Focus, gorging yourself before you work is a great way to give yourself a much-needed relief for the paper you’re in the middle of and fuel up for the rough night ahead.

Tip 6: Do all of the chores that you’ve putting off doing before you start. Laundry? Do it. Cleaning the kitchen? Done. Changing your car’s oil? Boom. Doing these menial tasks that you’ve been putting off doing for weeks will put you in the mood to do more work. It is recommended to take a break of at least two to three hours before you start doing your homework so you have time to recharge. After all, you’re only human.

Tip 7: Take a nap in the middle. Nothing says productivity more than a power nap. Your mom told you that taking a nap is a great way to recharge and boost your creative energy, so take a two-hour nap in the middle of your paper to give your brain a chance to rest. You’ve been working for half an hour after all, you’ve earned this.

Tip 8: Cry. Crying is a great way to give yourself a much needed cathartic moment after you’ve worked so hard. This is the hardest you’ve ever worked for school — you’ve been working for 45 minutes so far and you still have more to do. A stress cry is a great way to give your mind a break instead of just doing your work. After all, bosses respect employees who cry after doing the bare minimum requirements of their job.

If you follow these tips, you’ll get your work done, get good grades, and keep your life on track. I used all of these tips and this article only took me four hours to write, so imagine what they could do for you.