The Eternal Struggle: Self-Discipline vs Motivation

It's only fitting that for this blog post, I waited until the last minute to do it. Granted, this week I had a decent excuse for my procrastination. If you haven't read my other blog post, in my post "21... A birthday I will never forget" I go into the story of why I'm a little behind.

F Scott Fitzgerald said, "It's never too late to be whoever you want to be". This quote is something I try and remind myself of daily. I want to be the type of student who gets all his work done the minute he gets it.

Self-discipline is where poor students struggle the most. Students who don't actively work at school are destined to fall behind. If a student doesn't set a time when they are going to sit down and do their work, the issue falls onto the student's motivation.

Oxford Languages describes motivation as "the general desire or willingness of someone to do something." In my own experience, schoolwork is easier to do when I have a set schedule. It is so much easier if I say "Okay after I get home from school, I am going to make a snack then I'll start my homework." compared to "Oh, it's 11 o'clock and I haven't started my assignment, that is due in an hour."

Most of my readers are college students. If any of you are like me, I'd suggest doing what I stated in the prior paragraph. You don't have to do my plan of "Making a snack then working on homework" just as long as you have a plan, so motivation at 11 o'clock is not what is being relied on.

College is a time in life when self-discipline is called into question. Parents are no longer around to remind students to do homework. Success and failure are completely determined by the individual student's determination to do well.