Now Is The Time to Break From The 9 to 5 — Break From The Working Day

Why you should stop trying to be productive at 2pm

I think it’s a commonly known thing that we all have optimal times in the day for performing certain tasks. We know that 1pm, after a big lunch isn’t our best time to be planning our lives, or 11pm isn’t the best time to be crunching some numbers for your tax return.

This is called an ‘Ultradian Cycle’.

We all have one and they vary for each individual. Some people are ‘night owls’ or ‘early birds’ but I think there are some overall trends that I have recognised that apply to most people- or those that I have met, anyway.

If we were to plot this, I think it would look something like this:

Forgive the sketch, times of day are omitted – we all wake and sleep at different times. I argue this is relative to times after sleep and meals.

The Pilot and the Plane

Firstly, I’d like to introduce you to this theory of ‘The Pilot and the Plane’, I first heard about it on the podcast Not Overthinking, by Taimur and Ali Abdaal.

The idea is that you have times of the day when your mental state is more suited to critical thinking, planning and rational thought. You should use these times to ‘pilot the plane’ as such.

You should plan your day, month or year at these times. The rest of the time, you should ‘fly along the pilot’s route’. Ie carry out the plan you made earlier.

Mornings are golden, these are valued hours and are best for planning and completing the tasks that require the most brain power.

Maximise these hours, you will find that you can work harder for longer, I use 90 minute cycles to get the bulk of my work done in the morning.

Post-lunch hours are the worst, we’ve all experienced that heavy feeling where it’s pretty tough to get yourself to do anything.

Research agrees with this. I argue that you should use this time as your break, be active if you can to drag yourself through this period effectively, I use this time to get outside every day.

Evenings are weirdly effective for me, I find that I can be more effective at 2am than I can at 5pm. I suppose that makes me a ‘night-owl’ so your mileage may vary.

While you may be working from home, use this time to find times to work that are outside of the conventional 9 to 5. I take the early afternoon off and work past 5pm. This allows me a more enjoyable afternoon break in the sun and utilises an evening meal as a ‘post work routine’.

Gather Data

I found the best way to understand this is to track this data, set a reminder on your phone to track your rhythm a few times a day. A 1 to 5 star scale is all you need, after a week or so you will have a really good picture of how you should structure your day.

Work Smarter

I think To-do lists are the culprit for this, where we all feel that we should complete separate tasks in an order. Often this is the order that they are in the list, or putting off the toughest tasks for last.

You can use your productivity cycle to plan this more effectively, hold the more mentally challenging tasks for when your cycle is at it’s peaks, and save those monotonous tasks for those lower points. Eg. Sifting through emails to get to the ones that actually matter, can be saved for 2pm after a lunchtime burger.