Ch. 9: Focus Sessions as Doing Practice

One of the most impactful ways to move through resistance

It’s possible that no single technique has helped me more with facing the tasks I’m resisting than focus sessions.

Focus sessions are something I used to do on my own — I would pick a block of time, pick a hard task, and set a timer. Maybe play some music. And it worked really well.

But it was a decade or so ago when a friend shared with me the way she was able to writer her graduate thesis paper in astrophysics that my focus sessions became more powerful. She shared how she and her best friend would get together in person and work on their thesis papers together — and that was the reason she now had her PhD.

I said, “Brilliant!” And then started creating focus sessions for others, on video calls, in my programs. In my Fearless Living Academy (soon to be called Zen Habits Daily) and Fearless Mastery coaching cohort program, we have regular focus sessions on Zoom where we show up with our hardest work, tell each other what we’re going to do, then go on mute and get to work. At the end of the hour, we check out by sharing how it went. It’s magical.

Today I’d like to share how to use these focus sessions as doing practice for everything we’ve been looking at in this book.

Focus Session Practice

For the structure of the focus session, you can experiment to see what works best for you, but here’s what I recommend trying:

1. Do it with others (recommended) or alone: I recommend finding at least one other person to do these focus sessions with regularly. If you can get 3-4 people on a regular session (say, 8am in your time zone every weekday), then you’ll see some incredible magic happen. That said, it can be easier to just start alone — just be sure you’re just as committed to the sessions if you do it alone.

2. Set a date & time: I recommend a regular session — every weekday at a certain time, for example. Put it on the calendar, and commit to it. If you’re doing it with others, send them a calendar invite with video call link.

3. Decide on the task ahead of time: Before you start the session, decide what you’re going to do. I often will decide my main focus for the week, and use the sessions for that focus, but you can also just choose the most important task that you’re resisting doing.

4. Set an intention to start: If you’re doing it with others, go around the room and say what you’re going to work on. But also choose for yourself what you want to practice (see the paragraphs underneath #6 below) during the session.

5. Be all in during the session: Try to really devote yourself to the task and the practice. For example, you might be writing while also focus on single-tasking.

6. Check out at the end: At the end of the session, if you’re doing it with others, go around the room and share how it went. If you’re doing it alone, reflect on how it went — including how you practiced.

The magic of focus sessions is not just in getting difficult tasks done — though that’s also part of the magic. It’s in practicing everything we’ve been exploring in this book.

You can practice single-act practice, dropping mental constructs, walking towards what you resist, doing things with ease, or even choosing a task. Or pick your own practice!

In this way, the sessions help you get stuff done but also practice a new way of doing and being.

Exercise: Do 3 Focus Sessions This Coming Week

I challenge you to do at least 3 focus sessions — alone or with others — this coming week. If you’d like to join my Fearless Living Academy and be a part of our focus sessions, I’d love to have you!

Choose something you’d like to practice for the week — single-act practice, dropping your mental construct, doing the task with ease, etc.

And see what magic happens. I’d love to hear from you in the comments!