What is known as the pomodoro technique is a common time management method. Set your (kitchen) timer to 25 minutes, and work until time is up. Take a short break and repeat. There is no particular reason for setting the time to 25 minutes, though, except that the person popularizing this particular variant used 25 minutes. I have recently discussed this with a friend, mentioning that I often use this with much shorter periods, like 10 minutes. I do this, when I need to get started — the first 2 minutes of writing tend to be the hardest one. On the other hand, once I get into the flow, I find any solution with popups or audible sounds (i.e. almost all of those I know) quite distracting. Perhaps I’m calling for a timer that starts with 10 minutes and then automatically sets itself to 20 or 40 minutes to motivate me to keep going?
Image credit: CC-BY Lenore Edman.
Didier Ruedin 