I always thought that I 'invest' most of my time in studying. I thought that I was a hard worker who spend lots of my time in doing homeworks and studying the materials that I have learned in class. But, come to think of it, I was wrong. Though I do spend lots of time sitting down in front of my desk, I do not spend all of my time in studying. I frequently recognize me doing something else. After a few minutes of studying or doing homeworks, I get distracted to my computer, my phone, or my iTouch, and do something else for a while. If I calculate my times spending, I guess that the time I goof around is much more than the time that I study. I wanted to know what kind of things distract me from doing my work, so for this week I used the Time Waster.
The picture in the right is a chart of the Time Waster. In the left column, I wrote down the times wasters, in other words, the distractions that keep me from doing my works. In the right column, I wrote down the tasks that I avoided, which are going to be my academic works. First thing I did was identifying my academic works and tasks; for my academic works, I have Japanese homework, CLS projects, Astronomy reading and homework, Math homework, and HOM homework and study exam. These are the works that I had and have to do, but avoiding them, becuase I was busy in doing something else; in short, I was distracted by other things that prevented me from doing my academic works. So, I listed the time waster, which is the distractions that I fall into. The top 5 distractions are: Watching TV; Doing Computer Game; Hanging Out; Surfing the Internet; Staying in My Room. These are the time waster that I 'use,' so I can avoid doing my tasks that should be the priority of my 'doing list.'
After I completed the task, I looked back and realized that I did not invest most of my time in studying and doing homeworks, but spend time in doing something else. By looking at this chart, I was able to recognize what were my distractions and time wasters that prevented me from studying. Now I know my time wasters, I should keep them in mind, and try not to fall into the distraction. Instead, I got to do my works first. After that, I can do the 'distractions.'
I also wasted my time mostly surfing on Internet and playing computer games. As I played computer games, I continuously told myself ", let's get back to work after playing for 10 more minutes." However, that 10 more minutes became 30 minutes, which eventually became an hour. Same with the Internet surfing. Although I did not have anything particular to look for, I kept on click websites after websites reading about something that I have never even been interested in simply because I did not want to work. In the end, I regretted for wasting my time... I need to get those distractions away from me!
ReplyDeleteOne of my biggest time waster is internet. Things like browsing the YouTube and looking up Facebook absolutely destroys my work schedule. I hope I can decrease the amount of time I spent on those two tasks. By decreasing the time spent on just above two tasks, I think I can manage my schedule much more efficiently. The time waster strategy seems to visualize what's wasting my time and eventually help me fix those problems.
ReplyDeleteTime wasters, they are very annoying at times when they lead to your procrastination. Internet can get you involved into it for very long and this will take your time away from doing what you are really supposed to do. For example, facebook will get you involved in it for long term of time, even after you actually started working on your task. They are distractions and are not helpful at all, so what I tend to do it I tell myself only when I finish my work, I will have a free period of my own when I can go on the internet...etc. Get the work done fast, then comes freedom.
ReplyDeleteI cannot believe that procrastination applies to all the courses that you are currently enrolled in. The same goes for me; different courses have different excuses to make and that eventually leads to procrastination. However, this strategy seemed to help you identify all the reasons and problems and i like how you found a resoluion of preventing such distractions. It seems that this strategy was built for you Yong Rhee~ Now get those works done! Good job
ReplyDeleteI agree with Yongjin on the fact that you are procrastination is being applied to all of your courses. Rhee! I am dissapointed to hear this from you. You identified your time wasters, now it is time for you to abandon those time wasters at least for the time being when you are working. I hope to hear good news and improvment from you Rhee.
ReplyDelete