Deep Work by Cal Newport is one of the most helpful books allowing me to write my first book, and now my third.

Deep Work vs Shallow Work

Deep Work: Professional activities performed in a state of distraction-free concentration that push your cognitive capabilities to the limit. These efforts create new value improve your skill, and are hard to replicate (examples: writing a book, researching a topic, writing software code, developing a business strategy).

Shallow Work: Noncognitively demanding, logistical-style tasks, often performed while distracted. These efforts tend to not create much new value in the world and are easy to replicate (examples: checking emails, responding to IMs, having the tv in the background, social media, and most other routine activities).

4 Philosophies (Approaches) to Deep Work

1. Monastic Approach – creating an entire lifestyle of focus and freedom from distraction

• Academics and scientists who totally disengage from society
• rare and difficult to apply for most people

2. Bimodal Approach – Disengaging from distractions to focus for a season (days, weeks at a time)

• Psychologist Carl Jung built a cabin in the woods to research a new psychology approach. He would leave his clinic he operating in normal seasons and retreat to this place for weeks at a time to work on his research and book.

3. Rhythmic Approach – Making regular scheduled daily time to focus on deep work for a period, leaving the rest of the day open to responsibilities and distractions.

• Jerry Seinfield once said that the way to be a better comic is to write better jokes. The way to write better jokes is to write every day. He encouraged a young comic to keep a calendar on his wall where he writes a red x for every day he writes jokes and to “not break the chain”
• Keep at it and the chain will grow longer every day

4. Journalistic Approach: find time as it becomes available for deep work

• A story was told of the famous Walter Isaacson retreating to his room on vacation to crank out more writing for his book and coming back down to hang out with friends after 20 minutes, relaxed and ready to relax again
• This approach takes skill to quickly transition from downtime to deep focus, but also works well for people with responsibilities 

If you are busy with responsibilities like me, the best approaches are likely 3 and 4. I make time daily (morning) to write, but also use any available unplanned time to make more progress. 

3 Tips To Create A Deep Work Habit

Here are 3 things you can do to help get into a state of deep work on your projects:

1. Have a discrete time and place to write or create – this creates familiarity and helps you build your routine.
2. Measure leading indicators: If your goal is to finish a book, break down the goal into daily targets that allow you to make progress each day towards that big goal (examples: # of words per day, amount of time working on your project). Doing so gives you a sense of accomplishment to keep going. 
3. Measure your daily targets: Don’t break the chain. Keep it up. Achieving this consistency will build incredible momentum (and confidence)!

Go Win!

---

Receive Your Monday Empowerment

---

Leadership Empowerment