In an age of network tools, in other words, knowledge workers increasingly replace deep work with the shallow alternative—constantly sending and receiving e-mail messages like human network routers, w...
If you want to become a superstar, mastering the relevant skills is necessary, but not sufficient. You
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.
Any pursuit—be it physical or cognitive—that supports high levels of skill can also generate a sense of sacredness.
Working right trumps finding the right work.
When you switch from some Task A to another Task B, your attention doesn’t immediately follow—a residue of your attention remains stuck thinking about the original task.
When paying more than $1,000 a day to write the chapter in a suite of an old hotel down the street from a Hogwarts-style castle, mustering the energy to begin and sustain this work is easier than if y...
When a branch of psychology, sometimes called performance psychology, began to systematically explore what separates experts (in many different fields) from everyone else. In the early 1990s, K. Ander...
What you need instead is a full-fledged philosophy of technology use, rooted in your deep values, that provides clear answers to the questions of what tools you should use and how you should use them...
Three crucial benefits provided by solitude: new ideas; an understanding of the self; and closeness to others.
This approach, in which you fit deep work wherever you can into your schedule, the journalist philosophy.
The skillful management of attention is the sine qua non of the good life and the key to improving virtually every aspect of your experience.
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...
Suggest starting with a careful review of the relevant variables for solving the problem and then storing these values in your working memory. For example, if you’re working on the outline for a book...
Running is cheaper than therapy.
If you just show up and work hard, you’ll soon hit a performance plateau beyond which you fail to get any better.
Big trends in business today actively decrease people’s ability to perform deep work, even though the benefits promised by these trends (e.g., increased serendipity, faster responses to requests, and...
A good process-centric message immediately closes the loop with respect to the project at hand. When a project is initiated by an e-mail that you send or receive, it squats in your mental landscape—be...
When it comes to deep work, in other words, consider the use of collaboration when appropriate, as it can push your results to a new level. At the same time, don’t lionize this quest for interaction a...
When it comes to creating work you love, following your passion is not particularly useful advice.