We all need breaks from our work, especially if our job is physically demanding or mentally taxing. However, simply sitting there and letting your mind wander as you eat lunch might not actually be the best way to refresh your mind, help you manage the stresses of the workday, and get back to a productive afternoon. Here are five tips on what you can do to improve your break.
Get away from your desk
If you spend all of your day sitting at the same desk, looking at the same screen, then sitting and having your lunch there as well is an easy way to make it feel like you never took a break in the first place. A change of scenery and the opportunity to stretch your legs can help you refresh a lot better, so that you can return with a renewed sense of focus when the break is done.
Get moving
Whether your work involves physical activity or sitting and typing at a desk, it’s a good idea to fit a little movement into your break. This might just mean stretching to help stave off the risks of issues like repetitive strain injury, but if your day is mostly sedentary, some fitness activities, even simple ones, can help you take care of your health and get your blood pumping, which also improves your mood.
Play a game
Depending on how much time you get during your break, the opportunity to take a quick break and play a game can be just what you need. Games like Solitaire and Freecell Solitaire can easily be played anywhere and can be done alongside something like listening to a podcast. It’s a great way to get your mind entirely off of the work track for a while, allowing you to come back more mentally refreshed.
Spend time with someone
Whether it’s your colleagues or you meet up with a friend or loved one during your break, social time can help you take your mind off your work entirely. Taking breaks with others is a much more effective way of reducing stress and improving your mood. Just make sure that you don’t make your break conversation about work. Sometimes, spilling can help you manage a stressful day but, usually, it just keeps you a little too grounded in “work mode.”
Avoid scrolling through social media
Social media might not be the literal devil, as some would suggest, but there is plenty of evidence to suggest that simply sitting and scrolling is one of the worst ways to spend your work break. For one, it can make time pass much faster than you realize. Your break might be over before you notice. What’s more, scrolling through the high-information and often high-emotion world of social media can lead to mental exhaustion, which is not conducive to a good break.
The type of break that best benefits you is going to depend, to some degree, on the type of work that you do. Find the right way to enhance your break above and make sure that you make better use of that downtime.
