Focus session for planning: 45 minutes, a stream, after a difficult conversation

1 Before you start

• 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.
• Dim the screen slightly. Bright screens make long sessions harder than they need to be.
• Give yourself permission to stop when the timer ends, even mid-sentence.
• Get water now, so you do not have to get up in fifteen minutes.

2 While the timer runs

• It is fine to stare at the wall for a minute. That is often where the answer is.
• 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.
• If you are bored, the boredom is usually the last thing before something clicks.

3 When it ends

• Say the session is finished, out loud if you can. It marks the boundary.
• 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.

4What to put on

a stream — Running water with small variation. Softer than rain and less repetitive than a fan.