Inside the mind of a master procastinator

In college, I was a government major, which meant writing a lot of papers. A normal student might spread the work out—starting early, making steady progress, and finishing on time. That was always my plan too. But when the deadline came closer, things never quite worked out that way. Instead, I would put things off, convincing myself I had plenty of time. And then, suddenly, I didn’t.

This pattern continued for every paper I wrote, but nothing compared to my 90-page senior thesis—a project I was supposed to spend an entire year on. I knew my usual last-minute strategy wouldn’t cut it, so I made a solid plan: start light, ramp up in the middle months, and then go full throttle toward the end. Easy enough, right? But then the first few months went by… and I did nothing. No problem, I thought, I’d just adjust the plan. Then more months passed—still no writing. Before I knew it, I had three days left and not a single word written. So I did what any procrastinator would do: I locked myself in a room, pulled two consecutive all-nighters (which, by the way, humans are not meant to do), and somehow cranked out 90 pages in 72 hours. I barely made the deadline.

A week later, I got a call from the school. My heart stopped. "Is this Tim Urban?" they asked. "Yes," I answered nervously. "We need to talk about your thesis." My mind raced. And then they said, "It’s the best one we’ve ever seen."

That didn’t happen. (But it was fun to imagine, right?) No, my thesis was terrible. But this experience made me think deeply about procrastination. I wanted to explain why I, and so many others, struggled with it. So I started researching and writing about it on my blog, Wait But Why.

I had a theory that procrastinators' brains functioned differently from non-procrastinators'. To test it, I even got an MRI scan of my brain and compared it to a non-procrastinator’s. The difference? While both of us had a Rational Decision-Maker, my brain also had an Instant Gratification Monkey. This Monkey is only interested in what’s easy and fun. So whenever I try to do something productive, the Monkey takes control, steering me toward watching random YouTube videos, rechecking the fridge, or falling down a Wikipedia rabbit hole.

The problem is, the Monkey doesn’t understand the big picture. It only cares about the present moment. Meanwhile, the Rational Decision-Maker—who actually wants me to achieve things—gets completely sidelined. This leads to a dangerous place I call the Dark Playground, where procrastinators waste time doing things that feel fun but are actually filled with guilt, stress, and regret.

But procrastinators do have a secret weapon: the Panic Monster. This guy stays asleep most of the time but wakes up when deadlines get dangerously close. And he’s the only thing that scares the Monkey away. The moment the Panic Monster kicks in, suddenly I can work like a machine—pulling all-nighters and meeting impossible deadlines.

This was exactly what happened when TED invited me to give a talk. I was thrilled! But instead of preparing, I procrastinated. At first, I convinced myself there was plenty of time. But as the deadline crept closer, TED released the speaker list—with my face on it. That’s when the Panic Monster woke up. Suddenly, the Monkey panicked and disappeared, and I finally got to work.

At first, I thought procrastination wasn’t a big deal—after all, the system worked (kind of). But after writing about it, I started getting emails from people all over the world—students, professionals, creatives—who were struggling. They weren’t just missing deadlines; they were missing out on their dreams. And that’s when I realized: there are two types of procrastination.

The first happens when there’s a deadline. The Panic Monster eventually saves the day. But the second kind? That’s much worse. It happens when there’s no deadline—when people want to start a business, write a book, get healthy, or make a big life change. Without a deadline, the Panic Monster never shows up. And so, nothing happens. Days turn into months, then years. Eventually, people look back and realize they never even started.

That’s why I believe everyone procrastinates in some way. Maybe not in their job, but in some part of life. And since we only get so many weeks in our lifetime, we need to be aware of what we’re putting off. Because if we don’t start now, when will we?

Well, maybe not today. But soon.