A 90-minute block for studying, with brown noise, when you are waiting for something

1 Before you start

• Write down the one thing you are going to do, in a single sentence, before you start.
• Remind yourself that you are allowed to produce something mediocre in the first pass.
• Close every tab that is not needed for this one task. Not minimised — closed.
• Decide in advance that a bad sentence is still progress.
• Decide now what you will do when the timer ends. Otherwise the decision will eat the first five minutes.

2 While the timer runs

• If the task suddenly feels impossible, make it smaller rather than stopping. One paragraph. One function. One row.
• When the timer feels too long, look at it less. The clock is not the task.
• If you feel the urge to check something, write it on the paper beside you and keep going. Deal with the list afterwards.
• If you are stuck, say the problem out loud. It changes what you can see.

3 When it ends

• Write down the question you could not answer, so it has somewhere to live.
• Stand up and move for at least two minutes. The break is part of the method, not a reward.
• Do not immediately open the thing you were avoiding. Give the block a proper end.

4What to put on

brown noise — Lower and softer than white noise, closer to a waterfall heard from a distance. Good if white noise feels too hissy.