This is a posting I had intended to put up a few weeks ago; my memory has been jogged by the alluring aromas in my local café where I have temporarily relocated thanks to extended internet failure…

I wouldn’t go telling my granny to suck eggs, of course. We’ve all read articles about the importance to freelancers of taking breaks, in terms of productivity, posture, sanity and so on…
Nonetheless, I’d be hard pressed to remember the last time I had taken such a long break in the middle of a working day as I did at a recent McMillan Coffee Morning. I took off two whole hours, well slightly more if you count the walk there and back… and all I did was sit back and smell the coffee (and yes sample a few bits of cake)!
No prospecting or networking of any kind, no discussion remotely relating to professional matters with other visitors.

This “day off” extended into two hours thanks to eating lunch out, another rarity for your average freelancer.

And yes, on the back of that I had a very productive afternoon, getting through a big chunk of work. And I wouldn’t attribute this so much to the caffeine effect, which is very short-lived in my case, as to a bit of a mental reboot.
So if like I did you find your enthusiasm for the task at hand ebbing, a short change of scenery can work wonders.