I love running at all times of the day, but my favorite choice of time is smack dab in the middle of my workday. There are many reasons for this, but the most important reason is to force myself to reset. One might argue that stopping and taking a lunch break is a good enough reset, but that is where you are wrong. If I try to use my lunch break for eating, I invariably get sucked back into work. Either I eat at my computer, or keep checking Slack. If I’m not doing either of those things, I’m cooking lunch for 4 hungry children who don’t have to be at school anymore. Needless to say, a lunch break is never a break and it’s far from a reset.

Why Reset?

By the moment I hit noontime I’ve probably been sitting in the same spot, for way too long, staring at a computer screen, eyes glazed over. Sometimes I’ve wallowed into a mud pile of problems, or can’t find the answer to a perplexing problem. I feel swamped, or stuck, or spinning in circles and my mind needs to disconnect, unplug and completely reset itself. Going on a run forces this reset. It causes me to disconnect from work and family by letting my mind unwind in a free and uninhibited way. Sometimes, I’ll keep thinking about problems, but instead of feeling stuck I will find a solution or have an idea. Some of my best ideas have come to me while I run.

No Excuses

A lot of the tech industry is comprised of people who work from home, although at this particular point in time a large majority of people are forced to work from home. It is super easy to not take a break. It’s even easier to start making excuses that there is no time to reset, that there is just too much work to be done. Taking time to exercise feels like it’s a loss of productive time, but I think it is the opposite. It is a gain of productive time, allowing your mind the space to freely think, to mull over complex problems and more often than not, be more clear to tackle the difficult problems and tasks of work.

I have always created space to reset and have guarded it like a precious gem. Instead of my productivity becoming hindered I have found that I am even more productive in the time that I do spend working.