Focus session · brainstorming · 45 min
45-minute brainstorming session with a train carriage and a timer, when you have been on screens all day
Sit down, press start, and generate options for 45 minutes. A single class period, the length most people can hold before the quality drops.
Press start. The timer keeps time so you do not have to look at a clock.
Find one place in your body that already feels fine. Use that as the starting point. After a day of screens, the eyes and the shoulders need this first. This works better when you don't overthink it.
1 Before you start
- Clear the surface in front of you down to the thing you are working on.
- Lower the bar until starting feels almost silly, then start.
- Write down the one thing you are going to do, in a single sentence, before you start.
- Decide in advance that a bad sentence is still progress.
- Turn off notifications for the next block, not just to silent.
2 While the timer runs
- If you are suddenly sleepy, stand up for ten seconds and sit back down.
- When the timer feels too long, look at it less. The clock is not the task.
- When you finish a piece, pause for three seconds before starting the next. It keeps the pace honest.
- When you notice you have drifted, do not restart the block. Just come back and carry on counting from where the timer is.
3 When it ends
- Note what you actually got done, not what you meant to get done.
- Say the session is finished, out loud if you can. It marks the boundary.
- Do not immediately open the thing you were avoiding. Give the block a proper end.
4What to put on
a train carriage — Rhythmic, low, and slightly rumbly. Many people find the motion-and-noise combination easier to work to than silence.
This page is a tool, not a course. Nothing is tracked, nothing is saved, and nobody is told whether you finished.
If this block does not fit, try 90-minute focus block for problem solving — vinyl crackle, when you have been on screens all day, 50-minute exam revision session with a library and a timer, when you have already had a long week or 45-minute focus block for reading — white noise, when you are somewhere unfamiliar.