I’ve done pretty much the same thing, but instead of time frames, I use “work chunks”.. It’s similar to your unit-based procrastination dash. This is a recent development, so who knows if I’ll stick to it, but this is what I’ve done: I would make it a point, for example, to set aside three or so topics that I want to write about. I would commit myself to writing just one article, then take a very short break, come back, and commit to the second article, and so forth. Before I knew it, I found that I was so jazzed that I was actually DOING shit, that I just began foregoing the small breaks and writing all three things in one sitting (they’re very short articles, in case anyone’s wondering. For longer articles, I’d divide it up into smaller chunks). I will admit that after doing this for about a couple hours, I get kinda tired, and take a rather longish break (this is unfortunately too easy when one works from home). But I try to get right back on it after that.

Your timing method will probably work really really well for organizing my unruly books and magazine collection though. And boy do I need help with that.

I just spent 1.5 minutes making a 10+2 playlist in iTunes. I hate beeping timers, but taking a break whenever “My Valuable Hunting Knife” comes on is totally manageable. Now to get typing, in time for some 10 minute instrumental opus. Ha!

That’s all fine - what I need to find is a method that works with forced breaks. I’m a software engineer - that means that I have to wait for my computer from time to time.

Unfortunately, getting focus back after these breaks is hard. Any ideas? (I’ll try out setting a timer for the break, instead of waiting for the finish - I have a rough idea how long tasks take. Maybe that’ll work. But any feedback is appreciated)

You could set up the free utility Time-Out! to do the same. Check it out at www.dejal.com. It’s flexible, and it forces you to take breaks; the only difference is that it actually disables your computer for the defined break time. So, for instance, I have it set up to ask me to take a 15-second break every 15 minutes, then a 5-minute break every hour. You can change all intervals.

I’m going to be honest with you. I’m actually using a very similar method to yours. This is how it works:

1) Switch on TV 2) Watch a TV show until the commercial brakes come on (usuall y takes 10 mins) 3) Do your work during the commercial breaks (usually 2 minutes) 4) Keep repeating the above, until the TV show ends.

Nice, eh?

Can someone suggest a Windows version of something similar to Minuteur? I tried looking for a konfabulator widget to do the same thing, but nothing that’s easy to reset

I love this, and this is one tactic that has worked for me, with a modification. I’ll work on something on my list for ten minutes, take a short break, then actually roll a pair of dice to indicate what to work on next. The idea of working on one project for an hour can be overwhelming at times, regardless of how many breaks one takes.

I have this problem, I hate going to campuss. I know I have to do it, the reason is so obvious (I need only to deal with graduation ceremony administrative business). But still, somehow, magically I always found a reasonfor myself resisting from doing it. Any suggestion? This is procrastination as well rite? I’m an easily distracted person.

Meh…ill start doing this tomorrow

Working better

Courtesy of Mike, I’ve started using a slighlty adjusted (read: “very adjusted”) version of Getting Things Done by David Allen. The problem I was having was procrastination, until this came along [link]. Brilliant method, and seems to do the trick (as …