Annotations
In his book The Use of Life (1895), the Victorian author John Lubbock wrote: Rest is not idleness, and to lie sometimes on the grass under the trees on a summers day, listening to the murmur of water, or watching the clouds float across the blue sky, is by no means a waste of time.
Moreover, studies show that good rest is not idleness. The most restorative forms of rest are active, not passive. Further, rest is a skill: with practice, you can learn to get better at it, and to get more out of it.
First, schedule your work around periods of uninterrupted, highly focused blocks of 90-120 minutes, followed by rest breaks of 20-30 minutes.
Second, schedule those work periods so you do your most important tasks during your periods of peak energy and focus (your ‘circadian highs’).
Winston Churchill advised that, for busy people: ‘It is not enough merely to switch off the lights which play upon the main and ordinary field of interest; a new field of interest must be illuminated.’