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Later in this book I write about the many wonders of returning to Gilmore Girls, but here’s an early example of the kind of mysterious and magical thing that sometimes occurred during the filming of the reboot.

This time last year, I was an unemployed actor who’d recently said goodbye to a TV show. There’s always a confusing transition when a show ends, especially one as enjoyable as Parenthood. The end of any job, especially a long-running one, puts you in a kind of fog. I wandered around having trouble making simple decisions, like should I work out first today or drop off the dry cleaning? Dry cleaning first, right? Yeah, that’s the way people normally—no, maybe work out first? You go from having your days completely regimented to everything suddenly being up to you, and it’s jarring. I wondered about things my brain hadn’t had time to ponder while working—like how people do that thing with their hands where they connect their fingertips in a way that makes the heart shape. You know that thing—it’s in ads and on book covers (hi, Sarah Dessen!) and in commercials, and everyone knows about it, right? Well, no one did that when I was growing up. I never saw it before, say, the last ten years. Maybe it just wasn’t a thing where I lived. But I’m pretty sure no one I knew anywhere did it. Could it be possible we’ve been on the planet this long and yet we only just thought of it? And if so, what took us so long? Doesn’t this deep thought just blow your mind? Now you have something to talk about at the dinner table tonight.

The problem is that this kind of ungrounded period isn’t great if you have, say, a writing assignment or three you’re supposed to be working on. I was inching toward the finish line on a few things when I really needed to be footing or mile-ing it in that direction. Instead, my mind meandered over topics such as “Do you ever wonder why people in Los Angeles cross the street so slowly but people in New York City always sort of jog-run?” But life can’t stay a Seinfeld rerun forever. Eventually, whether you’re ready or not, limbo comes to an end because you must meet the deadline, or you have to get back to work, or, at the very least, because the aimless wandering phase is replaced by another actor favorite, the “IT’S OVER IT’S ALL OVER I’LL NEVER WORK AGAIN” phase.

But as Gilmore Girls: A Year in the Life began, there was suddenly a pileup of due dates the likes of which I’d never experienced before. First, without much notice, I was back to filming—and not those cushy Parenthood hours either. I wasn’t sleeping in a bison carcass like Leo or anything, but I had suddenly returned to a very heavy workload. Obviously, this book was due. Not to mention the book that was due before this book was due. Then Mae and I sold The Royal We, and now that script was due too. I wished I could get back all the days I’d spent looking at vintage tile tables on Chairish and weighing the pros and cons of what time of day to drop off dry cleaning. Back then I’d had too much time on my hands; now I had too little.

One morning in the makeup trailer I was talking to Dan Bucatinsky, who plays Jim Nelson, the real-life editor of GQ magazine, in the show. He’s also a screenwriter, and his book Does This Baby Make Me Look Straight? is a hilarious and heartfelt memoir about adoption and being a gay dad. For a while we just dished and shared writer woes. I talked about the various projects I was juggling and my worry over making my deadlines. Then I said something out loud that I’d never quite articulated before: “I know I’ll get them done; I just really wish I had a less painful process.”

Dan dipped his chin down to peer at me over his glasses. “Lauren,” he said in a tone that also meant puh-lease, “call Don.”

Remember Don Roos and M.Y.O.B., the show I was on when I first got Gilmore Girls? Don Roos, the co-creator of Web Therapy, the writer of the screenplays Marley and Me and Happy Endings and Boys on the Side? Well, Don and Dan happen to be married. Don is funny and smart and I admire his work, and he’s been a successful screenwriter for a long time. He must be doing something right. So I called him, figuring at the very least we’d have a fun lunch, even if he couldn’t help with my procrastination problems.

I could have easily spent months and years staring at blank documents and staying up all night as I trial-and-errored my way through a few finished pages and many more images of vintage tile tables. But in the magical way that things just kept falling into place over the course of returning to the show, my question was answered on the very first try.

I had lunch with Don, and he explained his way of working to me, a method that’s been so effective he actually wrote it up to give to the many writers he mentors. It’s his variation on the Pomodoro technique, called Kitchen Timer, and it’s transformed the way I write—I now spend fewer hours being way more productive. It gave me structure where there was none. It has changed my life as a writer, and I hope it changes yours too. I love it so much that it makes me want to touch my fingertips together in that wonderful symbol we just invented in the last decade. (But seriously, what took us so long?)