Mission Lock: why a single-task focus timer beats a to-do app

The tab-switching tax

Most focus apps sit next to your task list. You start a 25-minute timer, then peek at the list, then reorder it, then add three new tasks, then wonder where the 25 minutes went. The timer measured attention. The interface stole it.

Promote one task. Hide the rest.

Mission Lock promotes a single task to the whole screen. The list is gone. Notifications quiet. A gold countdown ring is all you see, beneath the task title. There is nothing to reorganize, because there is nothing else in view.

Thirty or sixty

Two lengths, not fifteen. Thirty minutes for a sprint, sixty for deep work. The point of the ritual is the constraint — every extra dial is another decision you did not need to make.

Release when it is done, not when it rings

You can release the lock any time. Finishing early is a win, not a loss. The timer serves the task; the task never serves the timer.