Microbreaks: Listen to your Body
Melissa Painter | August, 22, 2024
I interviewed a surfer once. He used to describe his surfing as drawing a line on a wave. (Now granted, he was also a graphics designer, in fact the person who designed the poster for Endless Summer.) But that idea of making a line with movement is something that I've heard from more than a handful, plenty, a plethora of the adventurer athletes and dancers I have been lucky enough to speak to.
Those of us who don't, as a job, ski down a slope of powder; who don't inch our way up a rock wall, ultra-run our way across a landscape, leap our way to our full potential across a stage, make an elegant line with the point of our toe. Can't we also still imagine? This idea of the movement of our body creating something? Beautiful in real time? It’s why we say at Breakthru: “You never knew you were an artist. Your body is a paintbrush: Breakthru.”
Some of us wear trackers, and wearables. Things that constantly measure our movement or sleep. And report back. At Breakthru we say move to make. Move to create. Don't move to measure. Listen to your own body. That's where the intelligence lies. (Why does technology always want us to believe that what it is smart enough to track is what we desperately need to know?)
Find your Focus; Boost your Energy
At Breakthru Microbreaks we're not training you to teach you how to listen to us. We're inviting you to take the small moments of motion your body needs, and listen to it. Grant yourself pauses in the thinking part of your day to move. And see: If you were sitting still before, stuck on an idea, what does standing, stretching, breathing, moving give you in 2 minutes? How do you feel after? Ready? More confident? Joyful.
You have found more focus. You have boosted your energy.
Well, then you don't need us to measure how far your range of motion, what rate is your heartbeat. You just need us to remind you to take that moment, and to listen and learn for yourself. How it makes you feel.
Think on your feet. Shake it off. Jump for joy. Race off feel. Move your Mind.
To you, thoughts from Breakthru, from the dancers, from the athletes.
Breakthru in the World
Collaborations, Community, Partners and Press
An interview with Mark Morris and Melissa Painter: dance for all, movement in the workplace and through life, and giving employees the tools they need to feel good https://www.dance-enthusiast.com/features/the-dance-enthusiast-asks/view/Mark-Morris-Melissa-Painter-Breakthru-
Breakthru partners with Mark Morris Dance Group to bring the joy of movement to the workday and make dance more accessible for all https://www.danceinforma.com/2024/10/02/dancing-at-your-desk-mark-morris-dance-group-and-breakthru-create-dance-breaks-for-your-workday/
Microsoft for Startups Blog: Breakthru founder Melissa Painter: Expanding well-being in a distributed world with Microsoft Teams
Microsoft’s look into Melissa Painter and her app, Breakthru: the immersive well-being app that’s helping remote teams feel more centered, energized, and connected to their minds and bodies.
Analytics India Magazine: Prioritise Your Well-Being with Breakthru.me: The Immersive and Interactive Wellness Experience Designed for Everyone
Learn how Breakthru helps you take a quick break from your daily routine to get moving, without the need for any special equipment or gear.
Breakthru partners with the NHS to improve healthcare worker’s mental and physical health through microbreaks. In just under a year over, Breakthru is being used in over 85 percent of the NHS Trust organizations—and growing.
How Microsoft Teams helped the Breakthru app bring wellbeing to 45,000 organizations
Breakthru utilizes Microsoft Teams to reach employees where they are already working to help them create a microbreak habit that leads to improved motivation, focus, cognitive performance, and physical and mental wellness.