Deep Work

Looking at the title, I found this book interesting enough to quickly pull it off my friend’s bookshelf.

I was tagging along for what was almost a “take your kid to work” day. He was busy taking seemingly endless meetings, while I found a cozy corner in his office and started reading. Amidst green tea, filter coffee, lime soda, and 10k steps, I finished this book in a few hours 🙌🏽 Deep work 👏🏽

Deep Work makes a strong case for protecting your attention and deliberately creating periods of uninterrupted focus. A few ideas really stuck with me:

• You need both serendipitous encounters and time to think deeply. But distraction is a destroyer of depth. Just don’t try to do both at the same time. Keep the two pursuits separate, rather than mixing them together in a way that impedes both.
• Don’t wait for inspiration. There is a popular notion that artists work from inspiration, that there is some striking bolt or bubbling up of creative mojo from who knows where. But waiting for inspiration to strike is a terrible, terrible plan. In fact, perhaps the single best piece of advice for anyone trying to do creative work is to ignore inspiration. 🎨
• The chain method: Keep a visible streak of the days you’ve honoured your deep work commitment. Don’t break the chain.
• Time-block your focus: Even something as simple as 90-minute slots of uninterrupted work can make a huge difference. ⏳
• Beware the “any-benefit” mindset: Just because a tool like social media or a networking platform gives you some benefit, it doesn’t mean it’s worth accepting all the negatives that come with it.
• And perhaps my favourite thought: we who cut stones must always be envisioning cathedrals. The immediate task may be mundane, but the larger purpose gives it meaning. ⛪

That said, I don’t recommend reading the entire book. Some of the ideas are genuinely useful, but the author could have arrived at many of his points way, way earlier. There’s quite a bit of repetition, and if you’re already familiar with productivity and attention-management ideas, parts of it may feel painfully obvious.

So, if you ever come across a copy of Deep Work, my recommendation is: skim it.