Focus time, one hour ambientdailyroutine

This is a daily routine for time in motion and pause. Use “Focus time, one hour ambient” to bring a little wellness into the gaps of your day.

On days when I need to concentrate, if I change playlists and listen to them, an hour will pass by before I know it. My brain pauses for a moment every time the song changes, and my fingers lose typing speed when I hear the lyrics. Continuation is better than change for deep work.

An hour of ambient is a routine where music is used as a background, but the music is not the main character. This is a practice where your hands and head stay in one direction for a long time over the same sound.

How to choose an ambient hour

Stick to an hour of lyric-less ambient or lo-fi. Turn off shuffle, and it's okay to have the same track repeated. The volume is too low for conversation—just in the background. Using headphones reduces surrounding noise, and using speakers makes the air and sound in the room become one.

Turn off notifications before starting a task. Slack, Mail, Messenger—assuming you don't come in for an hour. Set the timer for 60 minutes and press the play button as soon as it starts. The first 10 minutes may not be immersive yet. Don't change the song then. Wait until your hand starts moving over the same sound.

Go to the end in one block

Just decide on one thing to do during this hour. Draft reports, code reviews, structure your slides—the longer the list, the more tabs open in between. After 25 minutes, the breathing becomes longer, and after about 40 minutes, the keyboard sound and ambient sound follow the same rhythm.

Don't stop 5 minutes before the end, and close out the last sentence or block until the timer goes off. If you stop when you think you're "almost done," it's difficult to continue. The experience of getting to the end within one block opens the door to the next focus.

After it's over, it's time to relax your ears

You don't have to turn off the music right away when the 60 minutes are up. Just turn the volume down and sit for two minutes to slowly bring your head out of work mode. This short interval is the buffer you need before moving on to the next meeting or checking email.

Take a quick look at the output of an hour's work—a few pages of drafts, organized slides, bugs resolved. If you associate it with a time when the ambient music was playing, the next time you play the same music, your body will go into focus mode first.

An hour of ambient doesn’t have to be locked in every day. Try using it 2-3 times a week, and only on one of your most difficult tasks. Same sound, same length, same place—the more it is repeated, the faster it starts.

Even on days when it's too quiet to concentrate without music, ambient music without lyrics is often enough. That boundary of having sound in your ears but not taking your head away is the key to this routine.