That urge to look at the clock will still rise up, and be replaced by a general feeling of uncertainty because you don’t know when the buzzer will ring. Using a timer will feel a bit strange at first. Once you start relying on timers and stop relying on clocks, you’ll be able to get deeper into “the zone” and you might be shocked to find that when the time finally comes to stop, you'd rather just keep playing. After all, you may be in the middle of something that you want to finish when the alarm finally goes off. Ideally it should be one that beeps once or twice and doesn’t keep ringing. If your goal is to practice for 30m, set a timer. Let’s consider some alternatives to looking at the clock. For example, if you look at the clock on your phone, every time you do that you set yourself up to be distracted by texts, emails, and Plants Vs.

This is bad for your practice success and should be avoided. Looking at the clock may also be adding distractions to your practice environment. When do you watch the clock? When you’re waiting, sitting through a meeting, or otherwise enduring a grueling experience. That’s because 90% of the time, when we’re looking at the clock it’s because we can’t wait for something to be over. However, once we’ve built the habit of looking at the clock into our practice goal, we’ve set ourselves up for demotivation and discouragement. We’ve committed to practicing for x minutes (typically 30 or 60) and we don’t want to stop until we’ve achieved this end.

We look at the clock during our practice because we are measuring a goal. Frustration, discouragement, and the urge to give up.

Stop the clock