Avoiding Fatigue in Writing
If you want to get a big project completed, say a novel or a sales project with multiple different articles, then you’ll want to treat it like a marathon.
The danger with pacing yourself over a whole day or longer is that you’ll either procrastinate and then rush (like a college student with an assignment due) or you’ll get fatigued and not want to press on.
Some Ideas on Avoiding Fatigue: “The Pomodoro Technique.”
There are several things that people do to avoid fatigue. The buzz-term going around now is “Pomodoro Technique.” The Pomodoro Technique is basically a time management system where you work for twenty five minutes and then rest for five minutes. This is called a Pomodoro.
It works quite well if you’re prone to spending five minutes procrastinating and then finding that five minutes has actually become an hour.
In the twenty-five minutes of the Pomodoro Technique, you work without distraction. If you don’t concentrate so well, you’ll get a lot more done than you think.
I’ve tried doing the Pomodoro Technique before, and it’s pretty good as a time management system out of the gate.
However, I don’t use it now – at least, not in an unmodified way. I’ll tell you why now.
The Problem With The Pomodoro Technique.
There is one major problem with the Pomodoro Technique.
Nobody has a “standard” or “average” internal clock. Having a one-size-fits-all twenty five minute period isn’t ideal for me, and it probably won’t be for a lot of people.
For instance, there are the ADHD types who can’t sit still for five minutes without wanting to do something else. They should lower the time.
There are those who – like me – take quite a while to “get into” their work. After 25 minutes, I’m just about starting to find my stride when I’m writing. That point is where I finally get warmed up and ideas start to flow. Taking a strict break every twenty-five minutes short-circuits the writing part of my brain, and I’m not as productive.
Then there are those who need a while to recharge. 25/5 is a good ratio, but some people need more rest than that. Some people need less rest than that. There are some people who can’t ‘relax’ because they’d rather be ‘doing’ constantly. The five minute break isn’t helpful to them.
So What’s The Alternative To The Pomodoro Technique?
This is something that has worked for me recently.
Firstly, you set a strict schedule. That’s the first step.
Then, you set a “getting started” time that’s realistic, achievable and all that.
Then, you sit and write until you need a break. It might be ten minutes, it might be fifty minutes. Either way, you work until the quality of your work starts diminishing.
The key part though is in the rest.
You rest for as long as you need.
“But what about my productivity?”
Your productivity will not go down so long as you return to working as soon as you feel refreshed. At least, that’s what I’ve found.
There is one key thing though that you need to do: nothing.
I am the sort of person who’ll spend hours reading if left to my own devices. Or, I’ll read a Wikipedia page and then get lost for two hours in some weird subject.
You can’t let that happen. So the solution is to do nothing.
By doing absolutely nothing, my body can tell me when it’s ready to go. I’m not filling it with new data, I’m not getting a dopamine blast every so often telling me to carry on playing a computer game. Most importantly, if you sit and do nothing (and you work in the same way as I do) you’ll get bored pretty quickly.
What looks great when you’re bored? Doing something.
If the only option is work or do nothing, you’ll do nothing until the point where you’re fully relaxed and ready to go. Then, you’ll find reasons to find your work exciting.
Outro
It’s a pretty short topic for the day as I’m busy elsewhere. (Hence this topic of the day.)
Sometimes, you have so much work to do, that you need to work through fatigue anyway. Tomorrow, I’ll talk about what I’ve discovered as regards writing through fatigue without sacrificing quality.
P.S. If any of you try this or the Pomodoro Technique, let me know what your results are and what sort of time schedules you find best for you.