I've had one of those really frustrating days when I feel I've achieved nothing in terms of working on my websites or writing articles.

I must have spent about 4 hours this morning trying to get an Amazon link on a website.  Now I may not always know what I'm doing, but I've done this lots of times before.  Could I get it to work?.  No I couldn't  - I must have downloaded about 7 different Amazon plugins and I couldn't get any of them to work.  Yes I do have a product key,  a secret key and my affiliate id.  I even just tried copying a link from inside my account and dropping it into the site.  None of them worked.  I could have cheerfully screamed (but I didn't) - it was very early in the morning and I like to keep on friendly terms with my neighbours.

After indulging in some negative self-talk,  telling myself how useless I am, I decided to walk away and do something else.  I played the piano, went for a hike and wrote some letters and drafted a section of a  dissertation I'm doing.  I'm no good at doing nothing so sitting and relaxing wasn't an option.

I came back to the thorny issue of my amazon links about an hour ago. What happened?  I did it in less than 5 minutes.

So what have I learnt today?  As a coach who talks to people about confidence issues (including time management)  I need to learn to take my own advice and take regular breaks.  It's often counter productive to keep working away at something when a break refreshes the mind.

I've now put up a large notice over my desk saying 'Take a Break' .  All I've got to do is remember to look at it!