How to Attack Laziness
Over a year ago, a frustrated writing consultant came to me and said, “I’ve had it. I can’t get my student to do anything. No matter what I try, he just doesn’t care about anything. He’s lazy. I feel like I’ve hit a brick wall. What should I do, Jered?”
Here’s the situation:
Students enrolled in English 110.03 are required to attend two separate half-hour sessions with a writing consultant per week.
The response to this is varied.
The majority of students use the sessions to bounce ideas, and rely on the consultant to find errors in their work.
A handful of students come prepared with questions, try to squeeze every last drop out of their time with their writing consultant, and ask for additional sessions to improve their writing.
And, of course, the lazy ones.
These are the students that see the sessions as a waste of time and only show up to play the part of a warm body to get credit for the course. You can spot these students as soon as they walk in to the session. They are the ones that prop their feet up on the desk, lean back in the chair, and clear all the worries from their mind.
And, coincidentally, these lazy students complain most about their professors. They say, “Our professor gives out too much homework. He expects too much. His assignments are stupid. He’s mean. He’s ugly. He’s boring. I hate this class.”
These lazy students bring in papers that are covered in red ink. They rush the assignment the night before because they put it off, and put it off. They don’t pay attention to what the professor said in class. They don’t read the assignment guidelines. As a result, their papers receive depressingly low grades.
Here’s what I notice about the lazy students:
They’re miserable.
Nothing seems to go right for the lazy student.
And, I think to myself, “Isn’t that fascinating… the contrast in students? On one end of the room is a student who gets straight A’s, has a passion and vigor about life, and loves what she’s doing. On the other end is a student who is failing out of college, has little to no drive to succeed, is absolutely miserable and, for the lack of a better phrase, hates the world.”
The Laziest Student of All Time?
One quarter, I met with a student that was particularly lazy. I mean, we’re talking lazy. He was so lazy that he started missing his consulting sessions after the second week. He stopped handing in essays on time. He stopped showing up to class. He stopped showing up to school, even. He appeared every once in a while.
Then, around the eighth week of classes he showed back up out of the blue. I said, “How are things going?” He said “not good.” He said that he has to make up lots of consulting sessions, and that he might have to retake all of his classes because he’s failing.
I said, “I don’t want to intrude, but is there something going on in your life that’s preventing you from doing your work?”
He said, “No. I just like to play video games and sleep. I hate school. School is boring.”
Now I thought: How do you turn this guy around?
His final essay was to write 5 pages on any topic he was interested in. He said he was having troubles coming up a topic. I said, “One of the things that experienced writers teach is to write what you know. You’ve talked about how much you like sleep and video games… Do you think that would make a good paper?”
He sat for a moment. Then, realizing the genius in the idea, said, “I think that sounds like a plan.”
So he went to work crafting an essay about the benefits of sleep and video games.
Mid-way through his rough draft he came to me and said that he’s realized something. He said that his excessive laziness playing video games and sleeping long hours had contributed to his downfall. He said that it had ruined his quarter, and that he regretted video games and sleeping too much.
I said, “Wow. That’s powerful.”
He said, “What do I do? Do I continue writing a paper about the benefits of sleep and video games, or do I add in the part about how it’s not good for me?”
You can imagine the smile that came across my face when I heard those words come out of his mouth.
I said, “Wow. I think you have something powerful here. Do you think you could write a strong paper on the idea?”
He said, “Yeah. I think it would make a better paper.”
So, what happened?
Guess what? He wrote the paper. He outlined. He wrote the rough draft. He edited and revised. He turned the paper in on time.
And guess what he got on it?
A “B.”
That was the highest grade he had ever received on a paper his entire adult life.
The Key to Attacking Laziness:
The key to attacking laziness is to become more disciplined. Discipline can only come through taking action.
When you feel yourself getting lazy, the best thing to do is ask “where is this taking me?”
You have to have willpower to say “I don’t want to go down the path of neglect and dig myself into a hole of failure. I choose to discipline myself and work towards a better life.”
I think the answer to attacking laziness is best described in a quote from Jim Rohn, who says, “We must all suffer from one of two pains: the pain of discipline or the pain of regret. The difference is discipline weighs ounces while regret weighs tons.”
Some people eat a lot of junk food and say “You only live once.” That’s true. And they might not notice the effects of what they’re doing to your body immediately. But down the road it’s going to catch up with them. When they are stricken with illness, they’ll say “I wish I would have eaten healthier.”
Some people spend all of their money and say “I’m having a good time.” They spend themselves in a hole, and look up and say, “I’m broke. I have nothing. I wish I would have taken better care of my money.”
Some people ruin relationships with other people because they’re lazy and they get too comfortable. They turn people away with their harsh criticisms. Then, they find themselves lonely and say “My God. What have I done? I wish I would have made strong, lasting friendships.”
And of course, people throw away their schooling years by doing just enough to get by. Then a few years down the road, they are ashamed at themselves and say “I wish I would have gotten more out of my schooling.”
The best advice: Don’t devalue yourself by sitting idle. Invest in yourself by doing something great.
You see, being lazy messes with the mind. Being lazy shatters your self worth. It doesn’t take long to fall into a hole and say “Wow. I’m lazy, and I’ve ruined a lot of things.”
Maybe you feel you’ve been lazy about something, or maybe you’re trying to help other people see that their laziness is not helping them invest in the future. Whatever the case may be, it’s important to remember one thing: We attack laziness with action.
Take massive amounts of determined action.
Once you take action, the results can motivate you to say “this is what I want, and I can do it.”
Once you tell yourself “I can do this, and it’s worth doing for my future,” and you take more and more action, you’ll gather the momentum to carry you on to do even greater things.
Newton’s first law tells it all: An object in motion stays in motion unless acted upon by an outside force.
Laziness is that outside force, and you must cut the weeds of laziness before they overtake your garden of life.
Discipline yourself to be the best you can be.
