Eat that Frog with a Pomodoro

I think that I’ve always been a procrastinator but the level of procrastination that I witnessed in myself during this quarantine and lockdown period is something that is in no way justifiable. The constant struggle of staying sane, the constant fear of losing someone you love to Covid, constant frustration of seeing people not taking it seriously and not following SOPs, all that, and the best coping mechanism was to procrastinate, to stay somewhere deep in your comfort zone and never come out.

7 months of staying home, and I finally realized that it was time to do something. The very first hitch that my relationship with procrastination had when I applied for Amal, it was the first step to come out of my comfort zone, and ever since the fellowship has officially started, our relationship dynamics have entirely changed. 😉

Using Pomodoro is as fun as the sound of its name. To begin with, I set up my alarm for 25 minutes and aimed to complete section 3 of my online course of #superhero resume. I managed to complete that in 21 minutes and, that also includes making notes and answering reflection questions. Every time my phone vibrated, I had this urge to reach out and check what was it, but I forced myself to stay focused and managed to complete my task. After completing it, I rewarded myself with some good dark chocolate.

Next, I had to write the mega project proposal document so, I set up my timer for that and focused on writing that. I managed to achieve what I was hoping for in 25 minutes. This time, I paid less attention to the distractions and was more focused than the first time. I didn’t do anything to reward myself this time (couldn’t risk opening social media, that wouldn’t have been a good thing (“- “).

For the next task, I decided to take a break from the screen and went to cleaning and arranging my room and the things I had to do were, dusting the bookshelf, arranging side tables, make the bed, fold clothes that came from laundry, and put them in the cupboard. So, I set up my timer and also my favorite playlist and dived into it. It was 23:17 on the timer when I had completed all this work. This time I rewarded myself with a cup of coffee (what even is better in this world than coffee?).

For my last task, I decided to write about some personal stuff and just for cathartic purposes. My worst habit is that I always keep pushing it and, even when I do, I keep checking my phone so, this time I decided to do it with complete focus and devote 25 minutes just to writing for myself. I kept writing until the timer beeped. And, to say I felt good after that would be a huge understatement.

My experience with this activity:

I managed to do the work in 2 hours, which otherwise would at least have taken me 3–4 hours to complete. And lately, my mind has been in overdrive and, every time I was doing something, multiple other windows were also open and, it was a bit difficult for me to focus on the task at hand.

Doing this activity was not difficult for me and, I also realized that this is an effective way to get more work done in less time. Overall, it was a really good and interesting experience. I would definitely try this more often in the future.