Pushing past what’s comfortable, however, is only one part of the deliberate-practice story; the other part is embracing honest feedback—even if it destroys what you thought was good. As Colvin explai...
Personal Goal: To maintain close and rewarding friendships with a group of people who are important to me. Key Activities Supporting This Goal: 1. Regularly take the time for meaningful connection w...
People have the need to put their hands on tools and to make things. We need this in order to feel whole. As Rogowski explains: Long ago we learned to think by using our hands, not the other way aroun...
Once we view these personal technology processes through the perspective of diminishing returns, we’ll gain the precise vocabulary we need to understand the validity of the second principle of minimal...
Most knowledge workers, however, as I argued earlier in this introduction, have lost their ability to perform deep work.
Just because you cannot avoid this tool altogether doesn’t mean you have to cede all authority over its role in your mental landscape
It was time for Morse to make his first major demonstration of his invention. All he needed was an inaugural message. Based on a suggestion from the daughter of the patent commissioner who had support...
It was the glacial writing progress during this year that drove Chappell to embrace the rhythmic method. He made a rule that he would wake up and start working by five thirty every morning. He would t...
If you service low-impact activities, therefore, you’re taking away time you could be spending on higher-impact activities.
If you don’t produce, you won’t thrive—no matter how skilled or talented you are. Having
How do people end up loving what they do?
Generally speaking, as knowledge work makes more complex demands of the labor force, it becomes harder to measure the value of an individual’s efforts.
First, when you focus only on what your work offers you, it makes you hyperaware of what you don’t like about it, leading to chronic unhappiness.
Driven by this insight, while my classmates contemplated their true calling, I went seeking opportunities to master rare skills that would yield big rewards.
Whiteboard effect. For some types of problems, working with someone else at the proverbial shared whiteboard can push you deeper than if you were working alone. The presence of the other party waiting...
Suggests that you transform the way you think about the different flavors of one-click approval indicators that populate the social media universe. Instead of seeing these easy clicks as a fun way to...
Study by Harvard Business School professor Leslie Perlow. In this study, a group of management consultants were asked to disconnect for a full day each workweek. The consultants were afraid the client...
Recognize a truth embraced by the most productive and important personalities of generations past: A deep life is a good life.
Musicians, athletes, and chess players, among others, know all about deliberate practice, but knowledge workers do not. Most knowledge workers avoid the uncomfortable strain of deliberate practice lik...
Your ritual needs to specify a location for your deep work efforts.