How To Unlock Insane Focus On Command

Photo by Simon Abrams on UnsplashDeep is different than cheap…

There’s a fundamental difference between cheap work and deep work.

In today’s world we emphasize, prioritize, and optimize for cheap work. However, cheap work can only get you so far.

Cheap work is frantic and busy. Cheap work is exhausted and burned out. Deep work and true productivity are none of those things.

Change your definition of productivity, change your life.

In this article, I’ll show you:

How to re-define focus to unlock your deepest mental powersHow to set and achieve “impossible goals” through a focused mindsetHow to remove the blockades and barriers preventing you from having what you truly want

The first thing you need to do is define what productivity means for you.

Really quick: there are actually 3 ways to enjoy this article:

1. Watch this YouTube video:

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2. Listen to this episode of the Dr. Benjamin Hardy Show (available on any podcast streaming service)

3. Continue reading this article (includes bonus content from Dr. Hardy’s team not available anywhere else)

1. Define What Productivity Actually Means

Most people define productivity as effort spent.

Their thought process goes like this: “If I spend 100 hours doing something, it must be valuable.”

The reality, however, is that that effort doesn’t actual equal results. Productivity is not linear.

For example, you could be putting huge amounts of effort into something, without really learning anything at all. This is the trap that Stephen Covey warned of, where your ladder is leaning against the “wrong wall.” On the flip side, you could also make a mental connection or breakthrough that only takes a few seconds.

To succeed, you’ll need to re-define what productivity actually means.

What is productivity?What is accomplishment?What do these things mean to you personally?

To define this for me, I have weekly meetings with a coach to leverage and increase my own productivity. One of the core questions we always ask each other is this:

“What was your deepest level of focus this week?”

Deepest does not necessarily mean longest.

For a long time, I defined focus by how long I was doing something, or how much effort I spent.

Because of this question, I have learned to re-define what focus means.

Focus is the measure of transformation that takes place between two points.

In this case, my measuring or reference point was between my last conversation with my coach.

Focus is not the length of time spent doing something.

Focus is not the quantity of things done.

Focus is not the amount of effort you spend.

Focus is the measure of transformation that takes place between two points.

That’s it.

This is a crucial distinction most people don’t understand.

The progress you make matters infinitely more than the time you spend doing something. There are many misunderstood ideas implemented in wildly incorrect ways operating on faulty assumptions in the self-help world, such as the “10,000 hour rule” popularized by Malcolm Gladwell. This rule stipulates that to become really good at something, you should spend 10,000 hours doing it.

The research of the actual 10,000 hour rule, however, focused on the transformation that the learners exhibited during those 10,000 hours. One could spend 10,000 hours practicing poorly and still not become a master.

True productivity is transformation.

True productivity is progress.

Looking back on one of the weeks I spoke with my coach, I realized I actually had made massive changes and massive progress towards my goals. I didn’t spend massive amounts of time on the key things, but the time I did spend, really mattered.

Rule #1: Focus is transformation and progress, not effort and time spent.

2. Focus On Quality, Not Quantity

If you’re focused on quantity, you’re trying to do more and more. Once again, productivity is not measured by time and effort.

If you’re focused on quality, you’re thinking about the next transformation you need to take. You’re thinking about who you ultimately want to become. You’re trying to become truly better with work performed.

This difference is easily observed in the way businesses operate. For many years, Microsoft focused on competing against Apple’s iPod through the Zune. Microsoft fiercely tracked and measured the numbers of MP3 sales and strategized how to capture more of the MP3 player market share.

They were playing a competitive game, based on quantity.

In the middle of this battle, Apple finished development of and launched the first iPhone, rendering both the Zune and the iPod irrelevant and outdated. The MP3 player market and competition has been rendered useless by a substantially newer and better technology.

Quality, not quantity.

Quantity is a baby crawling faster.

Quality is the baby who learns to walk.

Walking is a different game than crawling.

If you want to accomplish deep work, you’ll have to start solving much bigger problems.

When you solve bigger problems, you do what you truly want to do, rather than competing with other people. You learn to walk, instead of crawling faster.

Rule #2: Define whether your focus is a quantity (competitive) game, or a quality (infinite) game.

3. Catch Bigger Fish

In the book “Catching the Big Fish” by David Lynch, he likens consciousness and creativity to an ocean.

If you dwell at the surface, you can only see small fish. You are solving small problems and receiving small rewards. Cheap work.

If you only see small fish, you are working at a shallow level. As Cal Newport has said, shallow work is comprised of “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.”

When you go deep into the ocean, you find bigger problems. You start to see bigger fish.

When you start catching bigger fish, you’re experiencing greater transformation. You’re operating on a different playing field.

If you want to have massive focus on command, go deeper into the ocean. Start chasing bigger goals, and thus catching bigger fish.

The goal determines the process and therefore your actions. If the goal you’re trying to solve is much bigger than anything you’ve ever done, you’ll be forced to focus on results and quality. You’ll be forced to focus on bigger fish.

Dr. Alan Barnard, a top researcher in constraint theory, teaches that when you operate from “impossible goals,” you start to question your assumptions. You start asking better questions.

What are your impossible goals between now and the end of 2023?

What parameters do you need to change, in order to get there?

When it is literally impossible to reach your desired target than by any other way except going deep, you’ll know how. This is how deep focus is achieved.

Elon Musk is an excellent example of this. He teaches that when you go for something impossible, you have to stop operating from conventional thinking.

You stop operating from your past assumptions when you set impossible goals.

You also stop listening to the assumptions of other people.

You question the assumptions that are behind your goals and your desires.

You remove the assumptions that are no longer helping you reach your goal. In fact, you’ll remove everything that is unnecessary to accomplishing your goal.

You’ll stop operating from your past self.

You’ll become more curious, more open, and more focused.

You’ll find new ways to succeed.

You’ll start transforming.

You’ll start engaging in “deliberate practice” to reach your goal, rather than “habits.”

There’s a lot of talk about “habits” in the self-help world, but in reality, the definition of a habit is merely doing the same thing over and over again.

Coincidentally, this quote often attributed to Albert Einstein essentially likens habits to insanity.

“The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.” — Albert Einstein

Habits are a behavior that does not improve over time. Habits are the same behavior, repeated many times. Habits are automatic, reflexive responses to stimuli. Habits are always on autopilot. Habits are not focused.

“Deliberate practice,” on the other hand, is the art of doing things differently than how you currently do things.

Deliberate practice isn’t about the number of reps, it’s about the iterative improvement between those reps. The micro-improvements between those reps compound, resulting in a transformation.

Deliberate practice forces you to think creatively. It is, at its core, the exact opposite of habits. It requires you to show up new, differently, and better, every day.

One day of true, deliberate practice, is worth more than a year or even a lifetime of habits.

When you go for impossible goals, you’ll engage in deliberate practice, and progress rapidly to your future self.

Rule #3: Set much bigger goals, and discipline yourself to the exercise of deliberate practice to reach those goals.

4. Remove Friction

SpaceX’s Falcon 9 Rocket can travel at speeds of up to 18,000 miles per hour. Your car can probably go a little over 100. What enables this difference?

Air has less friction than land. Thin air, or space, has even less friction than that. The less friction, the more speed.

To go really, really fast, you’ll need to remove and eliminate friction.

“Focus on doing fewer things for great effect, rather than doing many things with side effects.” — Gary Keller & Jay Papasan, The One Thing

This is a fundamentally different level than what most people are accustomed to. Cheap work is about adding things, and that’s what most people instinctively reach for, in order to “feel” productive.

Deep work is about removing friction standing between you and the result. Deep work is about what Author Greg McKeown call less, but better.”

When you go for less, but better, you’ll become committed to removing every form of friction in your life, both internal and external.

Internal friction comes from not being honest about what you truly want.

As Robert Brault taught, “We are kept from our goal not by obstacles, but by a clear path to a lesser goal.”

You remove internal friction by being honest with yourself about your core goal.

What are you actually trying to accomplish?What do you truly want?

You’re likely doing too many things because you have competing priorities. In short, you haven’t decided what you truly want.

It takes a lot of courage to renegotiate your assumptions and ultimately your standards. Many of your current goals and priorities are keeping you too broad to actually focus.

External friction comes from any goal, circumstance, situation, or person, that’s not helping you become and stay focused. External friction can take many forms.

You may still be operating from assumptions you haven’t questioned yet. You may still be operating from what other people are doing or by your own conventional wisdom of how it should be done.

As you strip more and more internal and external friction away, you will make massive progress and massive transformation.

Rule #4: Remove any and all external and internal friction between who you are and who you want to be

5. Be Measured, Not Unmeasured

“What is measured, improves. That which is measured and reported improves exponentially.” — Karl Pearson

Cheap work is unmeasured.

When you’re operating at a shallow level, you’re not measuring your progress. When you’re not measuring, you can’t improve.

When you’re in deep work, you intentionally measure your progress. The goals you are working on when working deeply are too big and too important not to.

What you measure, you manage.

Measure meaningful progress in the few things that matter to you.

My team measures and reports key metrics every week and every month.

Those metrics become increasingly clearer and simpler as I become increasingly focused on my goals.

It’s not about time and effort, it’s about genuine progress. Key metrics measure transformation with complete objectivity. If you’re measuring and reporting key metrics regularly, you’ll be forced to simplify and decide what really matters.

You can know what you’re committed to, largely by what you say “no” to.

“I’m actually as proud of the things we haven’t done as the things I have done. Innovation is saying no to 1,000 things.” — Steve Jobs

The more things you remove, the fewer things will remain, and you will ultimately have more skin in the game with the things that are left. You’ll have created conditions that literally force you to focus. In psychology, this is known as a “forcing function.”

Rule #5: Focus is about doing a few things extremely well, and relentlessly measuring and improving those things.

Conclusion

In his book Deep Work, Cal Newport hypothesizes that deep work is becoming increasingly rare at the same time it is becoming increasingly valuable, due to our hyper-distracted world and the opportunities in today’s economy.

Deep work is something you can totally have.

Deep work means letting go of the wrong mindsets, smaller goals, and the wrong processes.

Deep work is how you unlock insane focus, whenever you want.

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