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Focus session · coding · 90 min

90-minute focus session for coding with a fireplace, when you cannot concentrate on anything else

90 minutes on coding — one function at a time, not the whole system. One full ultradian cycle, for work that needs a long runway.

90:00

Press start. The timer keeps time so you do not have to look at a clock.

Let the first out-breath be longer than the in-breath. Nothing dramatic, just longer. When concentration is gone, work with what is left. Keep it simple: breath in, breath out, notice.

1 Before you start

  • Go to the toilet first. It sounds trivial until you are mid-sentence.
  • If your mind is already racing, write down the three loudest thoughts before you begin.
  • Clear the surface in front of you down to the thing you are working on.
  • 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.

2 While the timer runs

  • When the timer feels too long, look at it less. The clock is not the task.
  • If the task suddenly feels impossible, make it smaller rather than stopping. One paragraph. One function. One row.
  • If a thought will not leave, give it one line on the page and return to the task.
  • If you are bored, the boredom is usually the last thing before something clicks.

3 When it ends

  • Leave the file open if you are coming back. Closing it makes restarting harder.
  • Decide whether the next block is the same task or a different one. Do not drift into it.
  • Look out of a window for thirty seconds. Your eyes have been at one distance for a while.

4What to put on

a fireplace — Crackles and a low roar underneath. Warm, irregular, and undemanding.

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 25-minute problem solving session with vinyl crackle and a timer, when you are cold and want to be warm, Deep work timer: 25 minutes of studying (birds at dawn), when nothing else has worked today or Focus session for problem solving: 50 minutes, a stream, if you are sceptical about all of this.