Not Peter, but something I’d personally add is to schedule using 30-minute slots, unless the nature of the activity precludes it (e.g. attend a concert, fly to Nassau). The two main benefits I noticed from imposing this time limit are (1) being able to focus much more intensely on the task at hand and (2) being able to work, rather than procrastinate, on tasks I find aversive. Here is an example of someone who applies this kind of “timeboxing” for learning languages, although he uses 15-minute intervals (I haven’t experimented much with different durations, and wouldn’t be surprised if quarter-hour slots work even better than half-hour slots, though at some point the costs of context-switching and time-keeping will exceed the benefits of increased focus and motivation).
My model of research seems like it happens in hours-long continuous threads, rather than 30 min blocks (let alone blocks that you can specific in advance)
At least in my experience, there’s nothing about research that requires engaging with it in “hours-long continuous threads”; what you do e.g. in a single two-hour session can be done in four half-hour sessions, on four successive days. I think the limiting factor is rather having sufficiently many concurrent (and non-time-sensitive) research projects that you can fill an entire workday with 30-minute slots each allocated to a different project. That may be challenging for some researchers, but it’s really not a problem if you write encyclopedias for a living.
Gee! Are there any other learnings you wish to add to this post?
Not Peter, but something I’d personally add is to schedule using 30-minute slots, unless the nature of the activity precludes it (e.g. attend a concert, fly to Nassau). The two main benefits I noticed from imposing this time limit are (1) being able to focus much more intensely on the task at hand and (2) being able to work, rather than procrastinate, on tasks I find aversive. Here is an example of someone who applies this kind of “timeboxing” for learning languages, although he uses 15-minute intervals (I haven’t experimented much with different durations, and wouldn’t be surprised if quarter-hour slots work even better than half-hour slots, though at some point the costs of context-switching and time-keeping will exceed the benefits of increased focus and motivation).
It seems that your main work is research (correct me if wrong), so I’m surprised you work in 30 min blocks
Yes, that is my main work. Could you elaborate on why you find this surprising?
My model of research seems like it happens in hours-long continuous threads, rather than 30 min blocks (let alone blocks that you can specific in advance)
At least in my experience, there’s nothing about research that requires engaging with it in “hours-long continuous threads”; what you do e.g. in a single two-hour session can be done in four half-hour sessions, on four successive days. I think the limiting factor is rather having sufficiently many concurrent (and non-time-sensitive) research projects that you can fill an entire workday with 30-minute slots each allocated to a different project. That may be challenging for some researchers, but it’s really not a problem if you write encyclopedias for a living.