How a Kitchen Timer Rocked my World — and my Productivity
When I think of kitchen timers, I think of my Nana (for the non-Yiddish speakers, that’s my grandmother). She was a little woman with a lot of heart. She loved her family and she loved cooking for us. I remember she had a little egg timer that, of course, looked like an egg. It was white and yellow and always sat on the back of the stove against that 70’s silver metallic wallpaper in the kitchen.
If I close my eyes, I can still smell the salty ocean air mixed with the smell of Nana’s carrot cake baking in the oven. It’s a memory that even today feels like the warm embrace that can only come from a grandmother.
It’s probably also important to note here, that this was long before anyone would have even had the slightest inkling that at some point in the future we would have “smart devices” that we would just talk to. But when Nana was cooking, that egg timer may have been one of the most important tools to assure a dinner that would make her precious grandchildren smile.
And for a little device, that thing made a big, big sound.
Fast forward a lot of years and a world away from Nana’s kitchen. Those memories of playing on the beach, listening to the waves, and savouring Nana’s meals are a distant memory. Instead, I’m sitting in my little apartment in Amsterdam with the world on lockdown in response to the global pandemic.
Concentration … What?
With so much going on in the world, my attention span is fighting me. Focus is slightly elusive as I turn to music and headphones in an effort to drown out the sounds around me. Out my “office” window are kids using our little courtyard walkway as their skate park, squealing as they go back and forth and back and forth on their scooter. It’s adorable. Kind of. At least it might be if I weren’t trying to work. Maybe…
From the open window on the other side of the house comes the strumming and singing of the street minstrel (my newly coined term of slight endearment/disdain for him) who doesn’t realize—or doesn’t care—that his audience of shoppers are now quarantined in their homes and only rush out in times of desperation.
The struggle to concentrate is real—and having the kitchen just a few feet away doesn’t help either.
But let’s go back to the kitchen, because, after all, this story is all about a basic kitchen staple.
Keep it simple
At least I wasn’t alone. It was around this time that just about everyone was talking about their tips for working at home. The topics of conversation—and concern—ranged from screaming kids and homeschooling to making time and space to exercise to setting up an effective workspace and sharing your new workspace with your partner.
Somewhere in this slight cacophony of information was a little nugget about the Pomodoro Method.
Here’s the gist of it: Take a kitchen timer — like Nana’s egg timer — set it for 25 minutes, pick something on your to-do list, and work. Just work. For 25 minutes. When the 25 minutes are up, put a check on a piece of paper to acknowledge what you did, and give yourself a short break. Then repeat three more times, and congratulations, when you make your fourth checkmark, you now get an even longer break.
That’s all there is to it. It’s simple and yet it may also be proof that sometimes simple is all we need.
Why Pomodoro?
The method, or at least the decision of someone clearly much smarter than me to take a simple method like this, give it an official name, brand it, and do some uber-creative marketing, goes back to the late 1980s. That’s when Francesco Cirillo, the smart person mentioned above, came up with this simple yet brilliant idea and started to popularize it.
Cirillo landed on the name Pomodoro because his timer happened to be one those bright red tomato-shaped ones and the Italian word for tomato is Pomodoro. Yes, the name is just that simple too.
Why the Pomodoro Technique Works — IMO
Look, if you Google the Pomodoro Technique, you will find no shortage of articles about it. Again, I ask, why wouldn’t people grasp onto it. It’s so simple and these days you don’t even need a cute little kitchen timer to do it — although, my opinion (not that you asked), is that a plastic timer that makes you smile makes it that much more fun.
So what do I have to add this already busy conversation? Well, I’ll tell you 5 reasons why I think it works, beyond the simplicity of it.
- The Check Mark
When I was a kid and we used to use Chandler’s Assignment Notebooks to keep track of our homework, I was the kid who would also write down subjects that didn’t have any homework just so I could cross it off and feel like I had kind of accomplished something. There’s something rewarding about seeing the checkmarks lined up on a piece of paper to get you excited and make you want more. It’s not all that different from when your teacher used to give you a gold star. It may have just been a silly little sticker, but it held a ton of meaning and pride. - The Reward
Sure, the idea is to be productive, but there’s something exciting about knowing when you hit the magical 25-minute mark, you can get up and do something else. Again, I go back to this childhood thing. Remember when you used to watch the hands on the big clock in the room because you knew at 11:36 and 13 seconds the bell was going to ring for lunchtime and you’d get to play with your friends … or some version of that? This is kind of like that. You know that a reward is coming — and when you do it 4 times, you get an even bigger reward. - One less thing to think about
People who talk about habits and choice say that one of the benefits of taking choice out of the equation and making a habit into must-do (or vice versa) is that it’s one less thing for your brain to have to think about. This is like that. You don’t have to think about how long you’re going to work on something. That decision is made for you. You just have to decide what to work on — and my guess is that there’s a long list of option — and start working. - Personalise it
Egg-shaped timer, tomato-shaped timer, a cat timer, or an app. Whatever your style, there’s a timer for that! My one tip here is to make it something that makes you smile. - The flow
Sure, the idea here is not so much about getting into the flow, but instead is to get you to just focus for a set amount of time. But, for me, the most surprising benefit of all, has been the flow that I get into. Oftentimes I’m slightly disappointed when the timer goes off because I’ve found that with my brain focused on the task at hand, I actually get into the groove more than ever before and the break may be something I do, but it’s not something I need or crave. And, to be honest, call me a rulebreaker, but there are plenty of times that I just give myself my little checkmark, reset the timer, and go again.
Can I sit here and say that it works every moment of every day? Definitely not? Can I say that it’s no doubt improved my productivity? A thousand percent, yes!
According to Cirillo’s website, 2 million people have adopted this technique and 2 million people can’t really be wrong, can they? Maybe don’t answer that but instead try it for yourself. What do you have to lose, other than a few bucks on a timer if you decide to go that route and 25 minutes of your life? Sorry, hate to point out the obvious, but I’m pretty sure you’ve probably wasted more than that in the past few months of lockdown!
And if you want to learn even more, because, like I said, this guy has made a seriously impressive business out of this, check out his site.
I’d love to hear your thoughts on the Pomodoro Technique too or even other productivity hacks that have worked for you.