1) Anything that requires its own sequence of meditations, distinct from those you do daily. For example, some years ago Dolores Ashcroft-Nowicki published a book called The Sacred Cord Meditations, giving an initiatory series of meditations and practices based on a particular, somewhat odd rosary. Those are best done apart from other practices. In the same way, when I retake one of the occult correspondence courses I've done -- those should always be done multiple times, as each pass teaches you more than the one before -- I do that work in the evenings.

2) Yes, exactly -- study, or meditation, or journaling, or some other non-ritual mode of practice.