Inbox Sand: Five Tips to Beat Procrastination

Idea Sandbox is an interesting site/blog on creativity and fresh thinking. They also have a newsletter I subscribed to. Not to long ago I received one titled: "Five tips to beat Procrastination". One of them struck me:
  • Keep Yourself Fresh: 48/12 Rule - For each hour, work for 48 minutes followed by a 12 minute break. This really works. The 12-minutes gives you a nice break. The 48-minute push helps you crank through your work. Even if you're on a roll, still take a refresher break. (Especially if your work requires using a computer screen... the 12-minutes is a nice break for your eyes... and in the end reduces overall fatigue).
This is basically the 80-20 rule! My experience is that most people find breaks signs of laziness, working all day long without breaks is cool and shows your tough.
But how many people actually apply this rule? For instance, if you have a two-hour meeting, you might stop for a short coffee break, but nobody I know stops for a total of around 30 minutes in a 2 hour meeting.
Anyway, maybe we should do this and see if it works. My experience is breaks open up your world, help you solve problems you were locked into and just make work so much more fun.

Comments

  1. Paul (from Idea Sandbox)July 28, 2008 at 11:22 AM

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  2. Paul (from Idea Sandbox)July 28, 2008 at 11:25 AM

    Samuel - I was skeptical at first about this. I read about someone else doing it and even asked...

    "What if you're on a roll and don't want to break the pace?"

    The suggestion was to still take the break because it is more important to keep yourself fresh to maintain the pace than to squeeze all the energy out at once.

    Thank you again for being a member of Sand for Your Inbox! - Paul

    ReplyDelete

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