Procrastination vs a tomato!

How many times has this happenned to you: You have a test or an assignment or something as simple as a quiz set on a specific date or a deadline you have to submit before, initially you think you have enough time, but in a blink of an eye you realize that whatever you had is due by tomorrow! 

I think every student has experienced this many times, we have all encountered this hard to beat beast that prevents us from doing useful things in our life, this monster is called "Procrastination".

But just when thought our battle with this bad man will always be a terrific loss, came a noble man called Francesco Cirillo and developed this super powerful technique to beat procrastination, he called it "Pomodoro" which translates from Italian to "tomato". He was inspired by his kitchen clock which looked like a tomato and hence he assumed that he could destroy procrastination using tomatos.

Now how does this techinique work and how can you apply it? The answer is fairly simple, just follow these steps:

1. Pick 1 task to work on.
2. Work only on that task for 25 minutes, if something interesting or exciting shows up, you have to ignore it until the 25 minutes are over, that's the law!
3. Make note of distractions – This part is key. Whenever you think of another task that you need to work on or something you’d rather be doing, write it down on a piece of paper next to you.
4. Take a 5-minute break, repeat steps 1-3 three more times, and then take a longer break before starting again – Use your break to stretch, get a drink of water, or take a short walk. Regular breaks make you healthier and more productive.

You are now set to go, but if you like to know why this techinque has proven to be effective then stick around. The pomodoro techinque is trusted to work well because firstly, there’s only so much you can do to “force yourself” to complete a task. Using a timer takes that burden off of you and places it on an external machine that, barring power failure, doesn’t get tired and doesn’t care if you’d rather be doing something else. Secondly, The Pomodoro Technique avoids the problem of having in mind that whatever you need to do is too much and will take forever, by setting a fixed amount of time-based input for each task. You can do almost anything for 25 minutes, after all, particularly when you have a timer to remind you it will be over soon. Moreover, the pomodoro helps you keep distractions away and stay focused for this period of time, whatever comes to your mind can wait for 25 minutes and you can have some peace of mind.

As a final note, you do not have to own a kitchen timer shaped like a tomato to apply this techinque, there are many apps for the different mobile platforms that enable you to apply this techinque with just few clicks, some of them are:

• Focus Booster (Web, Windows, macOS, iOS, Android) for freelancers who work with multiple clients
• PomoDoneApp (Web, Windows, macOS, Linux, iOS, Android) for using Pomodoro with a third-party task management app
• Tide – A free app that combines a Pomodoro timer with ambient noise or your favorite music. It’s like Forest, but with more features. Available for both iOS and Android.

Reference: 

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

https://zapier.com/blog/best-pomodoro-apps/#focusbooster