All About Lunch
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How many leisurely lunches do you take in the course of a week or a month? What do I mean by a leisurely lunch? The kind where you leave your desk and go elsewhere, like a restaurant or lunch counter, or a park bench or a picnic table, depending on what is available, and are able to eat in peace. You get to experience the food, to chew slowly and thoroughly, to digest well, to linger for a moment after lunch, and when you’re ready, to head back to work.
If you’re not experiencing even one leisurely lunch per week right now, please set a goal for one. If you’re already at one or two, add another time per week. In the course of a month with 20 or 21 working days, if you can get up to five or seven leisurely lunches, the benefits will accrue. You’ll come back to the workplace less stressed, more energized, and better able to meet the challenges of the afternoon.
As a time saver, maybe it makes sense for you to make five lunches Sunday night, put them all in the freezer, grab the first one on Monday morning and have it ready for you when the lunch hour arrives. Then you’re not standing in line, or waiting for someone to serve you at a food establishment, and most importantly, you know what the ingredients are in your lunch.
Enjoy Your Leisurely Lunch
Do not gobble the food in front of you in two minutes, barely tasting it. This, in the long run, will not make you more productive. Please, take the time to chew slowly and carefully. Give up reading the newspaper and focus on the food in your mouth. Old sensations may return. You actually enjoy your lunch, digest your food better, do better back on the job, and have better elimination. What a deal!
Some insist on having lunch away from their desks. By getting away from the office, they are able to regenerate their batteries, and focus on their work and how they'll approach it. They feel that when you stay at your desk too long, every task competing for your attention, big and small, seems urgent. At any rate, the lunch break you have can be as fulfilling as a seven-day vacation.
