it’s about taking back control of your attention

Because attention is scarce, it is valuable. Every media organization — big or small, reputable or untrustworthy — is using every tactic at hand to engage us.

They need our attention to sell ads and subscriptions, to create value for their brands so we will become loyal consumers of their products.

Kojo added 5mo

Kojo added 6mo

So the aftermath of the Internet exploding is inevitably going to come with ambivalent, and even bittersweet, feelings. Many of us are probably going to miss the amazing sense of connection we have with people all around the globe and the book recommendations, free recipes and gardening tips, but, to no less an extent, are probably going to be extr... See more

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Kojo added 5mo

knowledge workers operate as a state of “divided attention,” in which the mind rarely gets closure before switching tasks, creating a muddle of competing activations and inhibitions that all add up to reduce our performance.

Cal Newport • A World Without Email

Kojo added 5mo

Epictetus’ father says that to be great, we first have to focus on “the empire between our ears.” He’s referring to our thoughts, our emotions, our urges, our desires, our fears...our own choices.

Rule The Empire Between Your Ears

Kojo added 5mo

The act of focusing our attention on a single thing (or at least attempting to do so) reveals to us how distracted we’ve been all along.

Allison Fallon • The Power of Writing It Down: A Simple Habit to Unlock Your Brain and Reimagine Your Life

Kojo added 5mo

"Paying rapt attention, whether to a trout stream or a novel, a do-it-yourself project or a prayer, increases your capacity for concentration, expands your inner boundaries, and lifts your spirits, but more important, it simply makes you feel that life is worth living." (Winifred Gallagher, Rapt)

Kojo added 5mo

“So much can be accomplished in one focused hour, especially when that hour is part of a routine, a sacred rhythm that becomes part of your daily life.”

— Dani Shapiro

David Brooks • Your Mental Diet

Kojo added 3mo

We’ve been given no shortage of digital tools that should, in theory, help us work better, with more focus and efficiency, and connect us more easily with our colleagues. Instead, email, instant messaging, remote-meeting apps, work-flow and project-management software and so on can feel like so many buckets with holes in the bottom, maddeningly in

Cal Newport • The Digital Workplace Is Designed to Bring You Down - The New York Times

Kojo added 6mo

The sensation is one of wandering aimlessly, picking up and putting down partly-interesting objects with a sense of generalized indifference. I started noticing something else, too: the impulses powering my behavior weren’t even articulated. The reason for checking and scrolling was rarely in response to an actual inquiry.

Lia Purpura • The Ecology of Attention

Kojo added 4mo