myUface Blog

Here at myUface we just announced that we would send the information of students who finish their myUface application by December 31st to U.S. universities, for free.  This is an excellent opportunity for you to market yourself to a number of U.S. universities, and we encourage you to take advantage of it.

But this is not the only deadline that matters for international students, of course.  Every scholarship program, every university, every consulate has hard deadlines that you as an international student must meet, or your dream of studying abroad may not occur.

Tragically, every year hundreds – if not thousands – of talented international students miss out on great educational opportunities for the simple reason that they wait until the last minute to fill out their applications.  As a result, they miss deadlines, or submit poor application materials.

Conclusion?  One of the most important pieces of advice we can give you is this:  DON’T PROCRASTINATE.  “Procrastination” means putting off doing something important and doing something frivolous instead.  Generally speaking, we procrastinate because we feel nervous about a particular task, and rather than face that nervousness, we find something “easy” to do.  We tell ourselves that we can always do the more difficult task later.

Of course, the truth is, every day we wait to do that important task, it becomes harder and harder.  Soon, we find ourselves running out of time, and a task that would have been easy is suddenly difficult – or even impossible.

DON’T LET THIS HAPPEN TO YOU!!!  In May, we posted a list of some online information about procrastination and how to fight it.  You may find these resources useful now, as you look ahead to approaching deadlines.  Most importantly, realize that the easiest solution to procrastination is to JUST DO IT – just start working on what needs to be done.   I know it can be hard, but the results of hard work are worth it!

One thing that bears repeating:  don’t procrastinate.  No, really.  Don’t.

Many international students fall into the trap of thinking, Well, I have soooooo much time before applications to U.S. universities are due, I really don’t need to worry about them now. As our Summer timeline showed, however, there are things you should be doing right now in order to get ready for the application process.  The more you put those things off, the more you procrastinate, the more difficult it’s going to be to prepare a competitive application.

We know, however, that it’s not an easy thing to “just stop procrastinating.”  Procrastination is a psychological condition that “can be a persistent and debilitating disorder in some people, causing significant psychological disability and dysfunction.” Overcoming procrastination takes effort and willpower.

To help those of you who have a disposition towards procrastination, I’ve found what I consider to be five excellent anti-procrastination resources on the web.  These sites may  not solve your procrastination, but they’ll at least  increase your awareness of the problem.

1. The procrastination research group offers a ton of resources about procrastination.  Highlights include an online comic about procrastination, a collection of academic research that’s been done on procrastination, and a quick self-help guide.
2. Freedomain radio offers a unique and somewhat inspirational lecture about the root causes of procrastination on You Tube.  Although this is not a medical or psychological opinion, it makes sense in a weird kind of way, and the “solution” it offers to procrastination is worth hearing.
3. If you want a one-page, no-nonsense “how to” guide to overcoming procrastination, you can’t do much better than this, from getmoredone.com.
4. Want a solution to a pressing life problem?  Chances are, you should talk to Oprah.  In this piece from Oprah’s magazine, Martha Beck extracts several Dos and Donts from a book, “The Knowing-Doing Gap.”  As you might imagine, these tips focus on how to get from knowing we need to do something to actually doing something about it.
5. This article focuses on how the internet fuels our ability to procrastinate, and gives us 25 specific actions we can take to reduce the internet’s negative influence in this regard.

If you feel that you really have a procrastination problem, and need more information than is available on the web, you might think about buying a book.  I mentioned “The Knowing-Doing Gap” above.  It’s not specifically about procrastination, it should be noted.  A book that is about procrastination, and which is popular enough to have gone through a number of editions, is “Do it Now.”

One important note here:  although you should look into these and other resources if you have a problem with procrastination, realize that spending a lot of time reading about procrastination can in itself be a form of procrastination!!! So don’t overdo it.

Now . . . get to work!