Category: “Personal Productivity”

In previous articles, we’ve talked about two of the three principles of Slow Productivity, a term used by Cal Newport in his book Slow Productivity: The Lost Art of Accomplishment Without Burnout to show that another kind of productivity, one that’s more in tune with human nature and less rushed, is possible.

Each new year arrives loaded with resolutions. Learn a new language, exercise more, read more books, develop a personal project… The list grows and grows, fueled by the excitement of becoming better versions of ourselves. But there’s a problem: our attention span and energy are limited, and as we continue to add commitments to our lives, we rarely stop to ask ourselves what we should eliminate.

Sooner or later, all knowledge workers inevitably face a certain moment. It happens differently for everyone, but the conclusion is always the same: “I can’t keep all this in my head anymore.”

Habits are simple choices we make at certain moments and, over time, we stop thinking about them even though we continue to do them. The sum of all our small daily choices determines, in the long term, who we are: how we eat, how we work, whether we exercise, how we relate to others. An infinite number of small details that have a huge impact on all aspects of our lives.

The Pomodoro Technique is a simple but effective time management method created by Francesco Cirillo in the late 1980s. The method divides your work into short intervals of intense concentration, traditionally 25 minutes, separated by short breaks. Each work interval is called a “pomodoro” (Italian for tomato, a term inspired by a tomato-shaped kitchen timer that Cirillo used as a student).