A 25-minute block for portfolio work, with distant traffic, when you are somewhere unfamiliar

1 Before you start

• Decide now what you will do when the timer ends. Otherwise the decision will eat the first five minutes.
• Promise yourself you will not check anything until the timer ends, including "just quickly".
• Make sure your chair is at a height where your feet are flat on the floor.
• Tell yourself the goal is time spent, not output produced.
• Put the thing you keep reaching for out of arm's reach.

2 While the timer runs

• If nothing is working, write badly on purpose for two minutes.
• When you have drifted for the fifth time, that is still four returns. Keep going.
• If the task suddenly feels impossible, make it smaller rather than stopping. One paragraph. One function. One row.
• 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

• Leave the desk tidier than you found it. Two minutes now saves ten later.
• Decide whether the next block is the same task or a different one. Do not drift into it.
• Put the notes you made where you will find them next time.

4What to put on

distant traffic — A low continuous wash from a road you are not on. Familiar and easy to stop hearing.