At the start of lockdown there was a lot of talk about how to live your best life with exercise routines, cooking, baking, learning languages and 14 pub quizzes every evening. Thankfully, it's been a few weeks since I've seen a banana bread. 

If, on the other hand, you were like me and steadily losing your marbles working from home stuck in front of a screen all day, the hours blended into one and you can be left thinking, what have I actually done.

Aside from having poor concentration, WFH means you are often on a call and your email is perpetually pinging whilst there is a weird mind trick where you feel that you need to be always accessible. 

I wanted to find a better way to work, which would help me focus, get stuff done but also accommodate that it's not quite a 'normal' working environment and encourage me to take proper breaks. 

Accordingly, a (much cleverer) friend introduced me to the Pomodoro Technique - a working technique which breaks your work down into small, achievable but ambitious targets - and waxed lyrical around how it enables him to achieve 3 hours work in 2 hours.

The idea being you find the optimum amount of time that you can meaningfully concentrate (e.g. 20, 25, 30 minutes) and then ruthlessly concentrate on smashing through a set list of task during that time period, then taking short breaks to reset.

The outcome? I find I can squeeze about an hour's leisurely work into one 35 minute slot and can get more than a half day's work in four slots done if I really push it. Of course, it's common sense, really, but having the recommendation from someone you trust and whose work ethic & success speaks for itself matters.

Rather than regurgitate what already exists, I've included a few links below, but if, like me, you want to achieve a bit more I would highly encourage giving it a rattle. 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pomodoro_Technique

https://francescocirillo.com/pages/pomodoro-technique

https://tomato-timer.com/