A 45-minute block for editing, with forest at dusk, when you cannot concentrate on anything else

1 Before you start

• Decide now what you will do when the timer ends. Otherwise the decision will eat the first five minutes.
• Remind yourself that you are allowed to produce something mediocre in the first pass.
• Close the door, or put headphones on, whichever signals "working" to the people around you.
• If you are dreading it, make the first action physical: open the file, sharpen the pencil.
• Get water now, so you do not have to get up in fifteen minutes.

2 While the timer runs

• If you are suddenly sleepy, stand up for ten seconds and sit back down.
• If you are stuck, say the problem out loud. It changes what you can see.
• If the task suddenly feels impossible, make it smaller rather than stopping. One paragraph. One function. One row.
• When you catch yourself re-reading the same sentence, stop and write down what you were looking for.

3 When it ends

• Look out of a window for thirty seconds. Your eyes have been at one distance for a while.
• Take the break away from the screen, even if it is just the other side of the room.
• Roll your shoulders and your neck before the next block.

4What to put on

forest at dusk — Birds settling, leaves moving, nothing sudden. It works because it sounds like a place you can safely ignore.