View from the Cheap Seats is an extension of the newsroom, which is frequently a site of heated debate on topics ranging from the extremely serious to the utterly ridiculous. This web edition features the views of print edition columnists Thom Barker (Wednesday) and Calvin Daniels (Friday), as well as web exclusive content by Devin Wilger (Thursday).
This week: What is your most productive time of day?
Early bird
My most productive time of day is first thing in the morning, specifically usually between about 6 a.m. and 9 a.m.
I’m not entirely sure why, but I tend to be most lucid at that time of day with better powers of concentration and motivation.
It hasn’t always been that way. I have gone through periods of my life when I’m sleeping that early in the morning, or up because I have not yet gone to bed. But, on balance, it is traditionally when I work best.
Some of it may be physiological or psychological, but it is also practical based on the general pattern of human activity. That is to say, during those early hours, you basically have your time to yourself and I have always had jobs in which other humans are more of a hindrance than a help to productivity.
If I was a salesperson, or banker perhaps, I probably couldn’t say the same because productivity is tied to the activity of others, but as a writer, other people tend to be distracting. I am, of course, talking about the actual activity of writing here. Ancillary activities such as interviewing and researching do sometimes require interpersonal interaction.
I first discovered the advantages of being the early bird when I worked in the high tech sector. That period, before the rest of the world gets moving, was a solid chunk of time generally free of distraction and interruption during which tasks such as programming and administering were much easier to complete.
There’s more to it than that obviously. I just seem to have more creativity during those hours. That may be more conditioning than something circadian, but it works for me.
If I’m not working, I also love being out at that time. It’s very peaceful.
-Thom Barker
Any time but early morning
I am not an early riser, it is my firmly held belief that we were not meant to be awake before 8:30 a.m. and even that is pushing it. In the rare times where I have been forced to be out of bed early, against my will for the most part, it has always felt like the world itself is trying to remind me how unnatural this practice is, the unsettling stillness of the early morning like the introduction to a horror film. You are not supposed to be here, the world seems to be saying. You are supposed to be in bed, still sleeping.
Still, the most productive time, at least for myself, is in the morning. Specifically, between 10:00 and 11:30 a.m, at which point I get hungry and progress slows dramatically. This was written in that time period, as is most of what I do on any given week. I tend to schedule everything so that time period is free, because for some reason that’s the time period where I seem to have the best luck getting words on paper.
I typically do all my sleeping before nine, my running around in the early afternoon and my leisure activities in the evening. It’s a great system, perfectly attuned to what I’m best at in any situation. In the afternoon, I am at my most restless, making going to places or conducting interviews make a great deal of sense, it’s a time of unfocused energy so having something to do that one can also do while moving around is ideal. I won’t use the word lazy for the evenings, but I do have a bad back and as a result it’s a great time to find a couch and firmly plant myself on it. Most importantly, early morning is a time for sleep, and I’ll likely be a late riser until my dying day.
-Devin Wilger
Sleeping late devine
This week we’re talking about time, or at least our favoured time of day.
For anyone who knows me at all, that is rather obvious, I am a devout night owl.
There are few things I like less than mornings.
Yes I will begrudgingly crawl out of bed to make it to work.
And yes, a chance to fish, or to head out to a disc golf event can get me going in the morning, but it is still with protest, and the extreme need for coffee.
My natural biorhythms are much more nocturnal in nature. I am even writing this at 9 p.m.
I recently took two weeks off, a rarity in ages for me. I did nothing but relax at home reading Sherlock Holmes pastiches and watching the tube.
But within a couple of days I had regressed to my happy place. It would be near 3 a.m. before I slipped the bookmarker into its pages, closed the windows on the notebook and headed to bed, destined to stay in the toasty covers until noon, or on the really good days, emerging about one o’clock.
So what is my favourite time, ideally the sweet spot sits between 7 p.m. and the wee hours of the morning. It is the time to write, to watch sports, read and just generally be in a happy place.
— Calvin Daniels
