Summary of 'Deep Work' by Cal Newport. (2 Summaries in 1: In-Depth Summary and Bonus 2-Page PDF.)

By his third year as a professor, Newport continued to find ways to improve his deep work practice. He also started to write the 70,000 word manuscript for Deep Work itself. Newport pushed himself to an extreme, ruthlessly turning down any non-essential commitments, and finding isolated places to work free of interruption. He used productive medita

K. Anders Ericsson found that experts' capacity for deliberate practice was limited to about four hours per day, due to both cognitive and physical fatigue. Like deliberate practice, deep work is also cognitively demanding, so it stands to reason that both share similar limits.

One solution to weaning yourself off of distraction is scheduling offline / online time blocks: a preset schedule for using the Internet. The rule is simple: you use the Internet only during online time blocks, while abstaining from Internet use during offline time blocks. Over time, if you adhere to the following 4 points regarding offline/online

6 Strategies To Reduce Shallow Work Quantify the depth of every activity Create a shallow work budget Schedule your entire day Use fixed-schedule productivity Learn how to say "no" Manage email senders

the whiteboard effect: Creative energies produced by team members while bouncing ideas and experiments off one another. Social pressure to make progress towards a mutual goal.

In the case of Internet distractions, the habit loop looks like this: Cue: boredom or frustration Routine: switch to Internet distraction (email, social media, games, news, etc.) Reward: feeling of relief, fun, stimulation and social validation As the loop is repeated, a habit forms which is reinforced by cravings.

For most long-term projects, hours of deep work are an important lead measure.

The work sprint is a technique that practices intense focus. Applying the work sprint to a task has 4 steps: Estimate how long the task usually takes when working at a normal pace. Create a deadline that is significantly shorter than the estimate. If possible, make a public commitment to the deadline for accountability and pressure. Use a countdown

2. Try a 30-Day Social Media Ban Ryan Nicodemus, looking to reduce the clutter in his life, used a simple tactic to identify the non-essentials out of his belongings. He packed all of his possessions into boxes, and over the next week, he went through his normal life routines. If he needed an item, he unpacked it. At the end of the week, he found that