As the world settles into the new normal of a pandemic, being indoors, no gym classes and constantly washing hands, employers and employees alike are working from home, many for the first time.

While by now everyone has figured out their style of working from home, it is vital to draw a distinction between work and personal life. Being indoors all day, it is very easy to slip into bad habits and destructive patterns. But, for optimum productivity, it is imperative that we indulge in self-care practices and take good care of our health.

From taking a break every few hours to working out to having a balanced meal, below are some self-care tips to boost your productivity while working from home.

Keep work and personal life separate

There is plenty of information out there preaching the difficulties of finding the perfect workspace while working from home: the living room’s too noisy, bedroom makes you lazy, so on and so forth. When working from home, it’s also very easy to fall into bad habits such as working at abnormal hours, taking calls from different parts of the house, etc. While it may be fun mixing things up from time to time, a dedicated workspace with fewer distractions and lots of natural light can help you get in and out of ‘work mode’ easily and, in turn, boost your productivity.

Stick to the routine

Our work routine will not be the same while working from home. While we would be saving on commute-time, coffee breaks with colleagues etc., we have to ensure that we incorporate the healthy habits from our work routines such as stretching our legs, getting some fresh air every so often. Another possible pitfall while working from home is to not pay attention to the clock. It’s very easy to fall into a pattern of taking calls late in the evening or even at night. To maintain a better work-life balance while working from home, it’s imperative that we come up with a new routine and stick to it.

Make breaks your best friend

There have been studies that show while working from home, people suffer more sleep problems, higher stress levels, and can actually end up working longer hours. It also shows that when working from home, people can be harder on themselves about their productivity levels. This higher level of stress, in turn, has a negative impact on the person’s health and productivity. So, it’s very important to take breaks every now and then to ensure that we perform at our optimum capacity. There are many different techniques that people are employing these days to improve and maintain their productivity levels. A time management technique that we can explore is the Pomodoro Technique, which allows a 5 min break after every 25 mins of continuous work.

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Indulge in some additional self-care

Whether it’s having some healthy snacks handy or sneaking in some stretches during breaks or diligently working out at the end of the day, a little extra self-care will go a long way in beating the quarantine blues. The current self-isolation practice has a far-reaching impact on us, both physical and mental. While we are aware of the physical impact and are trying to offset that by adding workouts to our daily routine, we should also pay attention to the mental aspect. Indulging in some mindfulness exercises, talking to friends and experts, spending time having fun with family etc. can help keep our minds more active and energized.

Working from home is a major transition and while certain industries are more equipped to do this than others, we all have to understand that to boost the productivity of a team we have to start with ourselves. Let’s see this as an opportunity for taking care of ourselves and through that being productive together.