Pomodoro Technique

Some of the most common words to hear from your health care providers are “don’t sit too long”. Sitting for hours on end has various negative health effects, including increased back pain, reduced heart health, impaired mood, and poor regulation of blood sugar. Unfortunately though, our society isn’t set up to make getting up and walking around throughout the day easy. Efficiency and having the appearance of being on task is highly valued in the workplace, and taking frequent, non-scheduled breaks isn’t always possible. It’s also common for people to feel that these frequent breaks interrupt their focus and make getting into a good workflow difficult. How do we reconcile the reality of needing to get work done with the desire to stay healthy by not sitting all day? Standing desks are great, but they don’t solve the problem of not allowing for actual movement, and they don’t solve the ‘fixed posture’ problem. Other solutions such as walking meetings range from being impractical to niche, and may not provide the frequent mobility that our bodies crave.

One technique that has started to be incorporated into graduate school curricula and adopted by certain psychology-savvy individuals is the Pomodoro. Meaning “tomato” in Italian, this simple-in-theory technique is similar in principle to high-intensity interval training (HIIT) for your brain. Initially developed by a university student named Francesco Cirillo, the Pomodoro asks us to acknowledge our limitations in attention and embrace interruptions as a strategy to improve our efficiency. This relatively simple process has been proven to improve memory, reduce work errors, and improve the total amount of work that can be done in a smaller period of time. It consists of 8 steps as follows.

1. Get into an optimal workspace, minimizing distractions and allowing for the highest possible level of focus. This means that phones and email are either turned off, silenced, or only accessible from another room.
2. Choose exactly one task to focus on. One project, one aspect of the job you are doing to minimize the amount your brain is switching tasks, which reduces lapses of focus.
3. Set a timer for 25 minutes. No more, no less.
4. Work. Maintain focus at your highest level, knowing that you have a break coming soon.
5. Stop work fully when the timer ends. You are taking a break now, and you fully focus on rest.
6. 5-minute break. Again, this means a 5-minute BREAK. Take the opportunity to leave the room if possible, get up and walk around.
7. Repeat this process 3 times.
8. Take a longer break, around 30 minutes, to allow for a more thorough reset before starting again at step one if there is still work to do.

There are two major benefits to this type of technique. The first is that it allows for maintenance of focus throughout a longer period of time than people can typically perform, which allows for improved retention and reduced error while working. The second is that, because it allows for more frequent scheduled breaks, it encourages getting up and leaving work alone for 5 minutes at a time. This is perfect for those of us with trouble unlocking ourselves from our chairs. Obviously, these types of techniques are more accessible for those of us who work from home or have some degree of freedom in our work schedules, but when appropriate, Pomodoros can be a powerful tool to allow for improved mental and physical health.