I Tried The 5-5-5-3 Method To Beat The 3pm Slump And Chronic Distraction

An intervention was needed.

Parents editor at HuffPost UK

I’ll be the first to admit my concentration levels aren’t great. In my twenties, I was pretty good at getting my head down and boshing out a project, free from distraction.

But nowadays, with the ping of social media notifications, WhatsApp messages, emails, Slack updates, news alerts, to-do list reminders, not to mention the 20 tabs I have open and need to flit between on a daily basis (and all the parenting mental load tabs running in the background: who needs picking up at what time tonight? What shall I make for dinner? Whose birthday party do I need to buy gifts for ahead of this weekend?), I am in a state of constant distraction.

It can be pretty exhausting.

Sometimes it feels like I can barely get one thing done – a task, an article, a bunch of emails fired out – without becoming distracted by about 13 other things that need to be done. And then the first task becomes this monster hill to climb.

Like most people, I’m not immune to the odd mid-afternoon slump, either. If I’ve had a disrupted night’s sleep – which happens a lot with kids under five – I often find this period is when my productivity nose-dives off a cliff.

So, I was intrigued to hear about the 5-5-5-3 method from career coach, Jo Irving. It’s a mindful productivity hack for getting things done, which involves:

Five minutes of planning,........

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