The problem here is that you're never finished with a school project or paper until the deadline. It's partially about Parkinson's Law, which says that a task will swell in complexity and perceived importance in order to fill the amount of time allotted to it. Now, Tim Ferriss would say to set stupid impossible deadlines. This doesn't exactly work for a university setting where the deadline, no matter how many ways you try to trick yourself into thinking the deadline is earlier. The other part of it is that nothing is ever finished and when a grade rides on it, there is always something you can do to tweak it until the deadline.

So, how do I deal with this? I have gotten pretty good at gauging how long my various projects will take. I'll use a real example that might help. I have a programming lab that is due on Thursday October 11. I know what it will take to meet the specs and I know how fast I can program in Java. So, given that information, I know I can safely not go to work on it until Tuesday after my two tests and book review are behind me. That might be a little more than your risk tolerance allows, but it works pretty well for me so far.

All of this isn't to say that I won't work on it between now and then, but I won't buckle down and engross myself in the assignment until Tuesday (at the earliest). I will likely use the programming lab as a productive procrastination between now and then to avoid doing something else.

HTH