Practices

Every practice in the library, in one list. Narrow it by how long you have, who it is written for, and where you are right now.

Narrowed down

342 practices
Area
How long you have · Twenty minutes
Who it is written for
Where you are right now
On your own, or with someone
Theme
Approach
When · Any ordinary day

Every extra step in a task is another place to lose it. Three clicks and done beats a process with a form, an envelope and a walk to the postbox, even when the second one saves a little money.

Before you commit to a routine, count its steps, then take some out. Bin bags stored next to the bin, stamps kept with the envelopes, paying on the…

Twenty minutesRemembering to do itADHD skillsQur’an 16:91

Name one old hurt with your spouse that still aches, gently and without re-litigating.

When you were not there that day, it marked me. Naming it is not attacking, it is asking to heal.

Twenty minutesRepair after ruptureEmotionally focusedQur’an 42:40

Where the harm has truly stopped, begin to set down a grievance you have carried.

Not forgetting, releasing. Once the wound is no longer being made, let it start to close.

Twenty minutesRepair after ruptureEmotionally focusedQur’an 24:22

Rest is not the prize waiting at the end of the work. It is part of what makes the work possible, and it does not have to be earned first.

Self control runs down over a day the way a battery does, and the thing that fills it back up is properly stopping. What that looks like is yours to…

Twenty minutesRest and pacingADHD skillsQur’an 10:67

If you carry a firm picture of how the world is supposed to work, the world will break it several times a day. No coping skill outpaces a supply of grievance that never runs out.

This is not a case for caring less about fairness. It is about telling apart an injustice you could act on from the general refusal of life to be…

Twenty minutesRighteous anger and perfectionismCoreQur’an 3:104

Someone who holds themselves to an exact standard will often hear a gentle correction as an attack. With them the useful thing is timing: build some trust before you offer the other way of seeing it.

The reframe you have ready is probably right and probably too early. Consistency matters enormously to this person, so an alternative view is not…

Twenty minutesRighteous anger and perfectionismCoreQur’an 16:125

Anger runs on the word should, and should is a word about debt. Write out what you believe this person owes you, then mark which of those they ever actually agreed to.

Most lists come out in two parts. There are the real agreements, said out loud and accepted, and there are the ones you assumed any decent person…

Twenty minutesRighteous anger and perfectionismCoreQur’an 4:58

Anger sticks around because it works, at least in the short run. Before trying to put it down, be honest about what it has been buying you.

Usually it is some form of leverage: people move faster, back down, stop asking. Sometimes it is plainer than that, a way to feel like something…

Twenty minutesRighteous anger and perfectionismCoreQur’an 9:105

Once this week, sit together unhurried and share one feeling and one reassurance.

Not logistics. How are we really, and what do you need from me. A regular heart to heart.

Twenty minutesRituals of connectionEmotionally focusedQur’an 30:21

Share one meal today with nothing else happening, no screen, no rush.

Undivided attention over something ordinary is a small daily ritual of belonging.

Twenty minutesRituals of connectionCoreQur’an 4:19

Keep a weekly date, just the two of you, to keep learning each other with open questions.

A regular two hours together, asking about dreams and hopes, keeps your map of each other current.

Twenty minutesRituals of connectionGottmanQur’an 25:74

Build one place or time in your day that reliably feels safe, and return to it when you need steadying.

Healing needs a floor to stand on. A predictable pocket of safety is that floor; protect it.

Twenty minutesSafety and groundingTrauma informedQur’an 6:82

There is a rough benchmark for homework: about ten minutes a night per school year, so a child in their first year does ten minutes and a final year student tops out near two hours.

It helps to have the number before a school meeting, because "this is too much" sounds like an opinion while a benchmark sounds like a standard. Some…

Twenty minutesScreens and attentionMedical and treatmentQur’an 2:286

A rule that holds in your house and nowhere else is not really a rule. Children locate the unrestricted house within about a week.

So the awkward job is the useful one: a short message to the parents of the two or three friends your child spends most weekends with, agreeing…

Twenty minutesScreens and attentionMedical and treatmentQur’an 4:140

Sitting with one long unrewarding task has got harder for almost everyone. If you are planning work for yourself, or setting it for someone else, build the variety in rather than hoping for stamina.

In practice that means breaking a long stretch into shorter ones with something marking the end of each, changing what the work looks like part way…

Twenty minutesScreens and attentionADHD skillsQur’an 24:37

Things posted in ten seconds have got young people excluded from school, and worse. It is worth asking about online conduct in the same routine way you would ask about anything else that could go badly.

Ask what has been posted, what has been sent, what someone would not want read out. Not as an inspection and not as a lecture about permanence, but…

Twenty minutesScreens and attentionCoreQur’an 23:3

Nobody gets far taking the drink away without asking what the drinking was for. It is the same here. Find out what the scrolling is doing for someone before you start subtracting hours.

It is doing something, or it would not have lasted this long. Company at one in the morning. A way to stop thinking. Somewhere they are good at…

Twenty minutesScreens and attentionCBTQur’an 3:14

If the phone was giving you company, an evening class in something practical will not cover it. Match what you put in its place to what it was actually providing.

Subtracting an hour and leaving the hour empty is the version that collapses by Thursday. If it was company, the replacement has people in it. If it…

Twenty minutesScreens and attentionCBTQur’an 28:77

Write down three to five things you actually enjoy, small ones, and do one of them a day. That is the whole instruction.

They have to be yours rather than the ones that sound impressive. Sitting in the garden with tea counts. Ten minutes on the guitar counts. Keep the…

Twenty minutesScreens and attentionCBTQur’an 33:35

An alarm that marks the end of a session rather than the start. A written list of what these apps give you and what they cost. The phone's own usage figures. An agreement that an hour of scrolling gets matched with an hour of something else. Pick whichever you would actually do.

The choosing is part of why any of it works. A limit handed down gets tested and beaten, while one somebody picked themselves tends to survive a bad…

Twenty minutesScreens and attentionCBTQur’an 17:110

Looking for a whole subject rather than a single practice? Start from the nine areas.