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The matinee test
午后场测试
How to take proper breaks from work.
如何在工作中好好休息。
The year 1843 was a tremendous one for humanity.
1843年对人类来说是意义重大的一年。
The Economist was founded.
那一年《经济学人》创刊了。
Almost as importantly, the modern weekend started to take shape.
几乎同样重要的是，现代周末开始成形。
A campaign was launched in Manchester to give industrial workers half a day off on Saturdays, designed to ensure that more of them turned up ready to work on Monday morning.
工人们在曼彻斯特发起了一场运动，争取让产业工人在每周六休息半天，以确保他们中有更多人在周一早上来上班时能准备好进入工作状态。
It succeeded, and the practice was eventually adopted into law; over time, a five-day week has become the norm in most countries.
这场运动成功了，这种休假制度最终被批准纳入法律；随着时间的推移，每周五天工作制已成为大多数国家的常态。
Whether it is the weekend, the summer holidays that many people in the northern hemisphere are currently taking or the daily rest periods that companies give to their employees, the right for people to take breaks is uncontested.
无论是周末，还是北半球许多人现在正在享受的夏季休假，亦或是公司给予员工的每日放松时间，人们休息的权利都是无可争议的。
But for white-collar workers in particular, the boundaries between working time and non-working time have become very blurry.
但尤其对于白领工作者而言，工作时间和非工作时间的界限已经变得非常模糊。
It is standard practice to eat lunch hunched over your desk: look down at your keyboard and you will see far more crumbs than characters.
在办公桌前弓着背吃午饭是一种标准做法：低头看看你的键盘，你会看到键盘上的食物碎屑比字符按键多得多。
It is normal to look at emails in the evening, at weekends and on holiday.
在晚上、周末和假期查看电子邮件也是正常的。
Deploring this development is too simple: the ability to choose when and where you work suits lots of people.
谴责这种情况是对问题的简化：毕竟能够选择何时何地工作对很多人来说很合适。
But it has also created the impression that you are always contactable.
但这种情况也造成了一种印象，即总是可以联系到你。
As long ago as 2013, Melissa Mazmanian of the University of California, Irvine and Wanda Orlikowski and JoAnne Yates of the MIT Sloan School of Management coined the term “the autonomy paradox” to describe how greater flexibility for individuals has led to diminished freedom for everyone to switch off.
早在2013年，加州大学欧文分校的梅利莎·马兹马尼亚以及麻省理工学院斯隆管理学院的万达·奥利科夫斯基和乔安·耶茨就创造了“自主性悖论”一词，即个人更大的灵活性如何导致所有人整体的关机不工作自由度降低。
Breaking out of this trap is hard.
摆脱这个困境是不容易的。
As a little experiment to assess your own degree of freedom, try to follow a recommendation from Cal Newport, a thoughtful writer on how the performative busyness of modern work impedes the ability to get important stuff done.
以下这个小实验可以让你评估自己的自由度，请试着遵循卡尔·纽波特的建议，这位有思想的作家描写了现代工作中的表演性忙碌如何阻碍人们完成重要事情。
In his latest book, “Slow Productivity”, Mr Newport advocates deliberately varying the intensity of work.
在他的新书《慢生产力》中，纽波特主张刻意改变工作强度。
Among other things, he suggests setting aside a weekday afternoon once a month to see a film.
其中一个建议是每月留出一个工作日的下午去看电影。
Taking three hours off every so often ought not to feel outlandish if you catch up on your work later.
如果你之后能赶上工作进度，那么偶尔休息三个小时应该不会让人觉得奇怪。
But few employers would react well to an out-of-office message that reads “I am watching Deadpool & Wolverine and will be slower to respond than normal.”
但是如果雇主收到一条在办公室之外发送的消息，上面写着“我正在看《死侍与金刚狼》，回复信息会比平时慢”，很少有雇主能对此有什么好态度。
So an uncomfortable degree of subterfuge is required.
所以你需要一定程度的、让你感到无法心安的掩饰。
First, following Mr Newport’s advice, you label the time as a “personal appointment”; never has a calendar entry looked more suspicious.
首先，按照纽波特的建议，你将这段时间标记为“私人会面”，日历表事项从未看起来如此可疑过。
Before you enter the cinema you check around for colleagues.
在你进入电影院之前，四处看看是否有同事。
A handful of single people are in there: you wonder how many of them are also at a “personal appointment”.
有几个人是独自来电影院：你在想他们中有多少人也在进行“私人会面”。
You are told to turn off your phone, the ultimate working-hours transgression.
（电影快开始时）你被告知要关闭手机，这是工作时间最大的违规行为。
The moment you leave you check it to make sure all hell has not broken loose in your absence.
关闭手机的那一刻，你会检查一下，确保你不在的时候一切都没有乱套。
During the film you feel guilty that you have been munching popcorn while everyone else has been working.
在看电影时，你会感到内疚，因为当其他人都在工作的时候，你在吃爆米花。
The whole experience is sufficiently draining that you need another rest.
整个翘班经历让人如此精疲力竭，以至于你需要再休息一次。
Managers may well feel that their workforce shouldn’t be heading off to the cinema whenever it feels like it.
经理们很可能会觉得，他们的员工不应该想什么时候去看电影就什么时候去。
But organisations should ensure that their employees do not mistake exhaustion for accomplishment or breaks for laziness.
但是组织也应该确保员工不会将疲惫误认为是成就，也不会将休息误认为是懒惰。
Mr Newport cites the example of 37signals, a software firm that works in six-week cycles.
纽波特引用了37信号的例子，37信号是一家以六周为工作周期的软件公司。
At the end of each cycle, developers take one or two weeks off scheduled projects to slow the pace.
在每个工作周期结束时，开发人员会从预定项目中抽出一到两周的时间来放慢工作节奏。
Slack, another software firm, ran a survey in which they found that only two in five of their employees felt comfortable taking breaks.
另一家软件公司Slack进行了一项调查，发现只有五分之二的员工认为能心安理得地休息。
It then conducted an experiment in which it prompted some of its workers to take time off during the day, and found that this led to marked improvements in their productivity and job satisfaction.
然后Slack进行了一项实验，让一些员工在白天休息一段时间，结果发现这显著提高了他们的工作效率和工作满意度。
If the encouragement of your employer is not forthcoming, some simple habits can still make for better breaks.
如果你的雇主没有鼓励休息，一些简单的习惯仍然可以让你更好地放松。
If you decide to work at weekends or on holidays, only do so during set periods so that you get at least some extended time off the treadmill.
如果你决定在周末或节假日工作，那么只在固定的时间段内工作，这样你远离工作的时间至少可以多一点。
During the workday, one tip stands out.
在工作日，有一个建议很重要。
A recent review of the research on work breaks by Zhanna Lyubykh of Simon Fraser University and her colleagues concluded that being outside was a better way to recharge.
西蒙弗雷泽大学的然娜·刘比克及其同事最近对工作休息研究进行了回顾，得出的结论是，待在户外是更好的充电方式。
A study of nurses by Makayla Cordoza, now of Vanderbilt University School of Nursing, and her co-authors found that breaks in the hospital garden mitigated the risk of burnout more than staying indoors.
范德比尔特大学护理学院的马凯拉·科尔多扎及其合著者对护士进行了一项研究，发现与待在室内相比，在医院花园里休息能更好地缓解职业倦怠的风险。
Switching off is hard enough.
想要彻底关机（远离工作）是很难的。
Staying in the office makes it tougher still.
但待在办公室会让休息变得更困难。
