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Use timed bursts

Studying can be daunting if a subject seems tough, or boring if a subject seems dull. There is a incredibly useful technique that works really well if you have a few subjects or tasks that you’re resisting in this way.

First write out a list of four or five topics that you need to study. Now set a timer for five minutes and work exclusively on the studying the first topic. Once the time is up reset the timer and move on to the next topic, repeating until you reach the end of the list. Now go around the list again, but add five minutes to the timer, so that this time you revise each topic for ten minutes.

Carry on in this way – studying the topics for a little longer each time you work through the list. When you finish all the studying you need to do on one of the topics, just cross it out and continue rotating through the others.

This works because there’s very little resistance when studying a topic for a short, fixed amount of time. As you get into the swing of revising a topic, resistance starts to shrink to the point where you can study for longer and longer periods.

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