I graphed my “procrastination guilt” level over the course of three weeks leading up to my thesis deadline. 

Used a simple 1–10 self-report rating per day. The result was a beautiful, terrifying guilt mountain peaking precisely 48 hours before submission.

Then it drops off a cliff the moment I hit “submit,” even if I know something was rushed.
Bonus axis: I tracked how many times I used the undo shortcut on my stylus during each writing session. The ESR Geo stylus shortcut logs helped there a bit since there was a lot to do.
The correlation between undo counts and guilt was… distressingly high. 

Also found I consume more caffeine on “low guilt” days. Probably compensating. What’s your weirdest data visualization of your own habits?

Posted by ThinXUnique

10 comments

  2. Well… obviously?

    And honestly, procrastination isn’t always a bad idea. You may know more or understand things better through passively absorbing it based on other things you’re learning about it by the end, you’re likely to get a better grade.

    Procrastination is only bad if you procrastinate to the point where you have no chance to finish it on time.

  3. Im surprised you still feel guilt after submitting, usually my guilt goes down to zero the moment i realize i can finish something i procrastinated on time

  4. In my mind I don’t procrastinate, I just schedule my work a day or two before it’s due date. Unless that task is something that will take longer than a day or two to do. I feel zero guilt, the day I got the task I checked the due date then made a mental or physical note to do it the day before.

  5. What’s the scale for caffeine? Is it the 0-120 from the undo count?

  6. What’s the scale for caffeine? You plotted points with no axis

  7. this needed context because i did not know what a submission window is

  8. Here, I am between reddit and cramming 1 day before another state occupational license test. I feel this in my soul right now.

  9. Curious if OP has ever been diagnosed with ADHD. The data would seem to suggest a need for stimulation, whether that’s from caffeine or the guilt/anxiety of a soon approaching deadline. I’m far too familiar with this data trend

  10. How long were you working on your thesis? Was this an undergraduate or graduate thesis?

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