Productivity Techniques

The Priming Technique

In the past, authors have been very fond of speaking of the left and right brain, but things are rather less clear-cut than this suggests, and today’s neuroscientists prefer to talk about two different modes of thought: the “linear” L-mode and the “rich” R-mode of brain function.

One interesting technique that you can use that exploits the rich mode of your brain is to put it to work while you are not paying particular attention to the problem.

The R-mode is a crucial component of your intellect, but it does not work in the way that we are brought up to think of as “intelligence.” It is not linear, it is not logical, and it certainly does not work on any particular schedule. We are mostly unaware of its various operations, and it may come back with some crucial insight at the most improbable times – or stay silent on a subject forever. There is no way of telling.

The R-mode is responsible for intuition, creativity, non-linear problem solving, and expert judgement. Instead of working through a problem step-by-step like the L-mode, it works more like a pattern-matching or search engine, making new associations, synthesizing concepts, etc. Stunningly, it is completely non-verbal, meaning it quite literally can’t put anything into words.

Don’t you just sometimes realize that something isn’t quite right, but you can’t quite put it into words? That’s R-mode activity returning a result, while L-mode activity is trying to catch up with what it has missed.

One potential problem with being fully focused on linear activities for long periods of time is that an overactive L-mode effectively suppresses the work of the R-mode. This is because some – but not all – of your “wetware” is shared between both modes of thinking, so while your L-mode activity is hogging all the resources, your R-mode activity is starved of resources.

You can exploit the fact that the R-mode does not require your conscious attention by letting it do your work for you while you focus on something else entirely. Obviously, the unpredictable nature of R-mode means that there is no guarantee that it will ever provide anything of value – but then again, it just might…and often does.

To some extent, taking regular breaks provides R-mode with an opportunity to synthesize what you have just learned and come up with new connections and further avenues for exploration, no matter what you do. In some situations, however, it can be beneficial to give the R-mode a little nudge in the right direction.

Especially when you are in the middle of a half-completed task, it is worth taking a few moments to fast-forward and predict what the next stumbling block for that task will be. Most intellectually challenging and creative tasks require you to make difficult decisions based on incomplete information or make seemingly arbitrary choices between largely equivalent alternatives.

If one of those choices or decisions is waiting for you when you come back from lunch, the first thing that will happen is that you just won’t know how to continue, and all progress on the task is effectively blocked until you make that choice. Should the love interest in your latest novel come from Spain or from Italy? Should you go to the Maldives or the Seychelles for your holidays?

If you can anticipate such road blocks before you begin your break, you can “prime” your R-mode to work on this decision or choice while you go out for lunch. Sometimes, you will draw a blank and will still be blocked by the problem, but frequently you will get that priceless insight “for free.” Of course, the love interest in your novel should come from Italy…from Siena, to be precise. This will let you describe that beautiful city and s/he could live in that little house close to the Duomo. You know, the place where you took that memorable photo during last summer’s visit. Of course, you should go to the Maldives for great diving rather than the Seychelles, because that’s where the famous Hammerhead Point is that you saw on that BBC documentary the other day.

Priming itself is very easy. Simply identify the problem and think about it for a few seconds. Think to yourself, “I’ll need to have a decision on this by the time I come back.”

If you want to, you can try to provide your brain with a bit of sensory input to make sure it gets the message. You can type your question, or, better yet, handwrite it or speak it aloud.

You obviously don’t have to wait until just before the break before you determine what the next road block is going to be. Vitamin-R’s Note Pads provide you with a convenient place to jot down any stray thoughts while they go through your head, and reviewing its Later section before you take your break is a good practice to develop and maintain.

The Breadcrumbs Technique

We all know it can be hard to pick up where we left off when returning from a break.

The reason for this is the limited capacity of our working memory. Briefly, we are limited to keeping somewhere between five and nine “chunks” of information at the forefront of our mind at any one time, and as soon as new chunks are pushed in, old ones are pushed out. Even after a very short break or interruption, our entire working memory is likely to have evaporated.

Reloading these chunks can be very tricky, and we often need quite a long time to get back to where we left off. Vitamin-R’s Note Pads already encourage us to jot down information to make it easier to stay on track during a time slice, and we can extend the same idea to helping us to more effectively re-launch ourselves into the next time slice.

Essentially, the chunks in our working memory function as pointers to long- and medium-term memory and we don’t need to remember everything that was in our head. Often, it is sufficient to jot down a few keywords that will jog our memory when we come back to work. These words are called breadcrumbs, as they help us find our way back.

Things that aren’t really in our long-term memory yet, however, will simply disappear without a trace when we direct our attention elsewhere. It can thus be useful to fully express such unarticulated ideas before going away and turning our attention elsewhere. The act itself of articulating your thoughts and putting them into words helps to create longer-term memories and makes them easier to retrieve later.

We do not recommend spending much time on leaving breadcrumbs for yourself. Just jot down a few thoughts on the Scratch PAd, and if you have an idea that you think may be important, take a few seconds to express it clearly in a single sentence.

The more you use Vitamin-R’s note pads the fewer breadcrumbs you need to leave, as the information will already have been collected during your time slice.

The Pomodoro Technique

The Pomodoro Technique, developed by Francesco Cirillo, is a time-management technique that uses a mechanical timer (“pomodoro” is the Italian term for the tomato shaped kitchen timer) to help maintain focus.

The timing aspects of the Vitamin-R approach are very similar to those advocated by the Pomodoro Technique, but Vitamin-R puts a higher value on flexibility and individual choice rater than rigid adherence to a pre-determined plan.

The Pomodoro Technique advocates a “rhythm” of:

25 minutes work, 5 minutes break, 25 minutes work, 5 minutes break, 25 minutes work, 5 minutes break, 25 minutes work, 15 minutes break

or

25-5 25-5 25-5 25-15

This does have its advantages and may work well for many people, but in my opinion it does not give enough scope for factoring in “human frailties,” such as fatigue, motivation, mental blocks, enthusiasm, etc. Nor does it account for any properties of the tasks you are dealing with. Overly rigid adherence to such a scheme will end up feeling like working at the rhythm of a machine.

Of course, Pomodoro Technique enthusiasts do modify the technique to suit their own needs, and so the timing aspects of Vitamin-R can be seen as a “modified” implementation of the Pomodoro Technique.

If you decide to implement the Pomodoro Technique, you can use Vitamin-R to do so. Vitamin-R doesn’t currently provide direct support for this technique, but is developed with the needs of all users, including Pomodoro Technique enthusiasts, in mind. With that in mind, let’s look at a few ways to adapt Vitamin-R as a “classic” Pomodoro tool.

Instead of using a mechanical kitchen timer, as the Pomodoro Technique suggests, you can configure Vitamin-R to continuously play the sound of a ticking clock. To do so:

Vitamin-R 3 ⇒ Preferences ⇒ Notifications ⇒ During Time Slice

Tick the Continuously Play checkbox and select one of the Ticking Clock tracks from its drop-down menu.

You can find out more about the Pomodoro Technique on Francesco Cirillo’s official web site or by reading the excellent and very much more accessible “Pomodoro Technique Illustrated” by Staffan Noteberg.