Focus session · planning · 90 min
Deep work timer: 90 minutes of planning (birds at dawn), when you have been meaning to start
One block of planning with birds at dawn underneath. 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 your belly be soft. Not sucked in. Just soft. You have been meaning to start. This is the least intimidating way in. No preamble. We start with the body.
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.
- Clear the surface in front of you down to the thing you are working on.
- Plan to leave the last two minutes for writing down where to pick up next time.
- Get water now, so you do not have to get up in fifteen minutes.
2 While the timer runs
- When you get an idea for something else, park it. Do not follow it.
- If nothing is working, write badly on purpose for two minutes.
- If a thought will not leave, give it one line on the page and return to the task.
- 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.
- Note what you actually got done, not what you meant to get done.
- Write down the question you could not answer, so it has somewhere to live.
4What to put on
birds at dawn — Bright but not sharp. Better for early sessions than for late ones.
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