Focus session · brainstorming · 50 min
50-minute focus session for brainstorming with a train carriage, when you are somewhere noisy
50 minutes on brainstorming — quantity before quality. Fifty minutes, the length of a therapy hour, with ten minutes off afterwards.
50:00
Press start. The timer keeps time so you do not have to look at a clock.
If you're lying down, let the mattress hold all of you. You can stop holding yourself up. Noise is fine. You are not trying to hear anything subtle. Follow the instructions and let the rest look after itself.
1 Before you start
- Write down the one thing you are going to do, in a single sentence, before you start.
- Let go of the version of this task you imagined doing perfectly.
- Have a piece of paper beside you for the thoughts that will try to interrupt.
- Accept that the first five minutes will feel like wading. Wading counts.
- Make sure your chair is at a height where your feet are flat on the floor.
2 While the timer runs
- If you are suddenly sleepy, stand up for ten seconds and sit back down.
- When you have drifted for the fifth time, that is still four returns. Keep going.
- If nothing is working, write badly on purpose for two minutes.
- When the timer feels too long, look at it less. The clock is not the task.
3 When it ends
- Leave the file open if you are coming back. Closing it makes restarting harder.
- Note what you actually got done, not what you meant to get done.
- 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.