Clinically validated cognitive conditioning exercises. 2–5 minutes to enter flow state. No signup. No data collected.
Free-write without editing. Silence your inner critic and let thoughts flow forward.
Track a moving target with your cursor. Train sustained attention and inhibitory control.
Strike keys in time with a visual metronome. Develop bilateral motor synchronisation.
Listen, remember, and recall. Challenge your working memory with an adaptive N-back task.
Overcome cognitive interference. Process incongruent stimuli under time pressure.
Guided breathing with an animated circle. Box, 4-7-8, or Calm Focus patterns with binaural beats.
Memorise and recreate cell sequences on a 4×4 grid. Adaptive difficulty that grows with you.
Warm up your fingers with a monkeytype-style speed test. Track WPM and accuracy.
Ground yourself with a guided sensory countdown. Name what you see, touch, hear, smell, and taste.
Sort cards by shifting rules under time pressure. Builds cognitive flexibility and executive function.
Click body regions to tense and release muscles. Clears physical tension for full immersion.
Guided reflection on your headspace, energy, and intentions before you begin.
Write what's weighing on you, then watch it dissolve. Acknowledge and release.
Name 3 things you're grateful for. A quick perspective shift before deep work.
Dump everything on your plate, then force-rank the top 3. Cut through mental clutter.
Define, prevent, repair, and weigh the cost of inaction. Tim Ferriss-style fear analysis.
Capture harsh self-talk, then rewrite it as a kind friend would. Side-by-side review.
Rate physical, emotional, mental, and purpose energy. Visualise on a radar chart.
Map your skill vs challenge level on a flow channel diagram. Find your optimal zone.
Set a Wish, visualise the Outcome, identify the Obstacle, and create a Plan. Science-backed goal setting.
Guided visualization to pre-activate neural pathways for effortless deep work.
Recall a small win and amplify it with sensory details. Elevate mood before deep work.
Release sticky thoughts by watching them float away. ACT-based technique for mental clarity.
Each session is standalone — no data is stored. Use headphones for binaural modules.
FlowState is a free, privacy-first cognitive conditioning platform. Each tool is designed to prime your brain for deep work using principles from neuroscience, cognitive psychology, and mindfulness research. No signup required — everything runs in your browser.
Overcome writer's block and perfectionism by writing continuously with no backspace or arrow keys. Based on free-writing research, this exercise silences your inner editor and trains forward momentum. Ideal for pre-work mental clearing.
Train sustained visual attention and inhibitory control by tracking a moving target with your cursor. Includes Go/No-Go freeze events that challenge impulse regulation. Modeled after attention training protocols used in cognitive neuroscience research.
Synchronise bilateral motor actions to a visual metronome while listening to gamma-frequency binaural beats (40 Hz). This dual-task paradigm engages cross-hemispheric coordination and has been shown to enhance cognitive readiness. Headphones required.
Challenge working memory with an adaptive dictation task. Listen to spoken word sequences of increasing length and type them back from memory. Difficulty scales with performance, providing continuous optimal challenge.
Overcome cognitive interference by identifying arrow directions regardless of their position on screen. Inspired by Stroop and Simon tasks, this exercise trains your ability to process incongruent stimuli under time pressure.
Follow an animated breathing circle through Box Breathing (4-4-4-4), 4-7-8 Relaxation, or Calm Focus (5-2-7) patterns. Accompanied by alpha-frequency binaural beats (10 Hz) to deepen relaxation. Evidence-based breathwork for stress reduction and focus.
Memorise and recreate sequences on a 4×4 grid. An adaptive N-back variant that adjusts difficulty based on your performance — sequences grow from 3 to 8 cells. One of the most well-studied paradigms for improving working memory capacity.
A guided reflection on your headspace, energy, and intentions before you begin work. Answer prompts about your current state and what you want to accomplish. Rooted in implementation intention research and mindful self-inquiry.
Write whatever is weighing on you, then watch it dissolve in an animation. Nothing is saved. Based on expressive writing research by James Pennebaker, this tool helps you acknowledge and release emotional weight before entering focused work.
Name three things you're grateful for with a quick celebration animation. Gratitude practices have been shown to increase positive affect, broaden attention, and build psychological resources — a powerful perspective shift before deep work.
Dump everything on your mind, then force-rank the top 3 priorities with drag-and-drop. Reduces decision fatigue and cognitive load by externalising tasks and committing to a clear order of attack. Inspired by the Ivy Lee Method.
A structured exercise from Tim Ferriss: define your worst-case fear, list ways to prevent it, plan how you'd repair it, and weigh the cost of doing nothing. Most fears are more survivable and reversible than we think. Break through analysis paralysis.
Capture the harsh words of your inner critic, then rewrite them as a kind friend would. Side-by-side comparison reveals the gap between self-criticism and self-compassion. Based on cognitive restructuring techniques from CBT.
Rate your physical, emotional, mental, and purpose energy on a 1–10 scale with optional notes. See your energy landscape on a radar chart. Identify which dimension needs attention today so you can work with your energy, not against it.
A monkeytype-style speed test that warms up your fine motor skills and hand-eye coordination before deep work. Choose 15, 30, or 60-second bursts. Real-time WPM, accuracy, and character-level feedback help you build a daily typing habit and track improvement over time.
The classic 5-4-3-2-1 grounding exercise from CBT and DBT. Name five things you see, four you can touch, three you hear, two you smell, and one you taste. Rapidly pulls attention out of rumination and back into the present moment — your launchpad for flow.
A fast-paced card-sorting game where the classification rule shifts every five correct answers — color, shape, then number. Inspired by the Wisconsin Card Sorting Test, it trains cognitive flexibility and set-shifting, key executive functions for flow readiness.
Progressive Muscle Relaxation guided by an interactive body map. Tap a muscle group, tense for 5 seconds, then release for 5 seconds. Releases held tension that blocks flow entry. Based on Jacobson's technique used in clinical and sports psychology.
Csikszentmihalyi's flow model visualised: slide your perceived skill and challenge levels on dual sliders and see where you land on the eight-zone flow diagram. Get personalised advice to nudge yourself into the Flow channel — the sweet spot where challenge meets skill.
Gabriele Oettingen's science-backed goal-setting method: Wish, Outcome, Obstacle, Plan. Walk through four guided prompts to set a clear intention and create an if-then implementation plan that dramatically increases follow-through.
A scripted guided visualisation that walks you through mentally rehearsing your upcoming task. Auto-advancing prompts with breathing ring animation and optional alpha-wave binaural beats deepen the experience. Used by elite athletes and performers to prime neural pathways before action.
Recall a recent small win, then amp up the positivity by exploring what you saw, heard, and felt. A body-glow animation invites you to sit with the feeling. Savoring strengthens positive neural pathways and builds the emotional capital needed for challenging deep work.
From ACT (Acceptance and Commitment Therapy): type a "sticky" thought, watch it appear as a draggable bubble labelled "just a thought," then drag it away to release. Weakens the grip of unhelpful cognitions so you can refocus on what matters.
Flow state — the optimal zone of performance where focus is effortless — doesn't happen by accident. Research shows that pre-task cognitive priming significantly improves the likelihood of entering flow. FlowState provides the exact exercises used in cognitive neuroscience labs and high-performance coaching, adapted into quick 2–5 minute sessions.
FlowState is free, open-source, and privacy-first. No data is collected, no accounts required. Built with Next.js, deployed on Vercel.