What you do during the break matters a lot. It should be rewarding and energizing or relaxing. Which reminds me, I’m on a break and shouldn’t be visiting LW.
Anyway, I’ve had success reducing an Ugh Field (around studying) by celebrating like a madman when the timer ended and then doing a few dishes (which I usually abhor, but is both relaxing and rewarding as a break). Once the Ughly Beast was down on its knees, I was able to abandon the timer and go over 25 minutes and I have been kicking its ass ever since.
Some suggestions for break activities:
dancing, jumping, throwing air punches
playing with a musical instrument
scribbling on a piece of paper
small housekeeping tasks
Avoid:
browsing, esp. reddit
anything that can’t be interrupted instantly e.g. reading or watching a video
anything that may cause an interruption later on or will occupy your mind e.g. beginning to cook
If the mere thought of a task is painful, you need preliminary taming of the Ugh field before considering pomodoro. But as always, beware of other-optimizing.
For reddit, I use leechblock with reddit.com on the blacklist but reddit.com/r on the whitelist. That way I can still check individual subreddits if they’re relevant to something, but can’t just constantly refresh the homepage and kill my day.
What you do during the break matters a lot. It should be rewarding and energizing or relaxing. Which reminds me, I’m on a break and shouldn’t be visiting LW.
Anyway, I’ve had success reducing an Ugh Field (around studying) by celebrating like a madman when the timer ended and then doing a few dishes (which I usually abhor, but is both relaxing and rewarding as a break). Once the Ughly Beast was down on its knees, I was able to abandon the timer and go over 25 minutes and I have been kicking its ass ever since.
Some suggestions for break activities:
dancing, jumping, throwing air punches
playing with a musical instrument
scribbling on a piece of paper
small housekeeping tasks
Avoid:
browsing, esp. reddit
anything that can’t be interrupted instantly e.g. reading or watching a video
anything that may cause an interruption later on or will occupy your mind e.g. beginning to cook
reddit
If the mere thought of a task is painful, you need preliminary taming of the Ugh field before considering pomodoro. But as always, beware of other-optimizing.
For reddit, I use leechblock with reddit.com on the blacklist but reddit.com/r on the whitelist. That way I can still check individual subreddits if they’re relevant to something, but can’t just constantly refresh the homepage and kill my day.