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March 27 - April 4, 2021
Dr. Bob was fully present. We were witnessing in real time his secret to success.
His insistence on single-tasking ensures that he learns and grows from every document he drafts and every interaction he’s involved in.
when I do multitask everything suffers.
He compartmentalizes his day down to the hour. Each compartment has ...
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his governing rule: “Do only one thing at a time.” Dr. Bob’s secret to doing so much is doing so little.
fMRI scans of the brain reveal it is impossible to do two things at once with a high level of quality.
countless studies show, the quality and, ironically, even the quantity of our work suffers when we are multitasking.
it may feel like we are getting twice as much done when multitasking, we’re actually getting close to half as much done.
The technologies that enable and facilitate multitasking can be addicting.
Apply the components of perfect practice each time you set out to do meaningful work:
•Define a purpose and concrete objectives for each working session.
•Remember that quality trumps quantity.
manipulative, design on the part of digital app makers,
the brain rewards us with more dopamine for the act of seeking a reward than for the act of receiving one.
Our earliest ancestors needed a compelling reason to endure days-long hunts for food with no guarantee of success. So we evolved to crave the chase.
Although most of us aren’t rewarded every time we check our phone, we are rewarded often enough to keep us checking.
89 percent of college students suffer from “phantom vibration syndrome.”
their subconscious longing for a notification manifested in a physical sensation.
researchers asked a group of college students to complete a series of difficult motor tasks when their cell phones were visible.
their performance was significantly worse than a control group where participants’ cell phones were not visible.
the best solution for preventing smartphone distraction is to remove it from the picture altogether.
The mere sight of a desirable object triggers dopamine, which is like the devil on our shoulder that says, “Are you sure you don’t want to have just one?”
•Identify what interrupts your deep focus.
•Remove distractors: Remember that only out of sight truly leads to out of mind.
Ericsson found that top performers across all fields are unable to sustain intense work and deep concentration for more than 2 hours.
Great performers, Ericsson found, generally work in chunks of 60 to 90 minutes separated by short breaks.
new research shows his conclusions also hold true in the workplace.
chunks of hard work followed by short breaks yielded the best performance.
the overall theme is clear: alternating between blocks of 50 to 90 minutes of intense work and recovery breaks of 7 to 20 minutes enables people to sustain the physical, cognitive, and emotional energy required for peak performance.
Even though they “gave away” about an hour of paid work, total output per employee remained unchanged.
By working smart—that is to say, alternating between blocks of hard work followed by short breaks—we get the most out of ourselves and avoid crippling fatigue and burnout.
This would seem to apply to exercise, especially running. The van Akin message for example.
Woldemar Gerschler
enable a runner to accomplish the greatest possible amount of high-quality work before fatigue caused performance to suffer.
intervals
Still miss using the term interval. If people recognize it to controlling factor is the rest break, the interval, this concept would be easier to understand, I think.
progressive employers are finally beginning to realize the value of intervals off the track.
it may take time to build yourself up to blocks of undistracted work.
So we better to write in short blocks of time, with a substantial break, and then see how many words I end up with at the end of the day, Rather than trying to write a certain number of words every day. Change my metric from number of words to amount of time, broken up into manageable blocks. Writing as interval training!
start with small chunks of 10 to 15 minutes and gradually increase the duration every week. No different from any other skill, deep work is a practice that must be cultivated over time.
•Divide your work into chunks of 50 to 90 minutes (this may vary by task). Start even smaller if you find yourself struggling to maintain attention.
And then divide those 50 to 90 minute blocks into shorter blocks of repetition with “walking brakes “in between. Just like a van Aaken run.
2 hours should be the uppermost limit for a working block.
Ghrelin is the hormone associated with hunger,
The contents of the milkshakes given to each group were exactly the same.
The only thing that differed was the description.
It was the participants’ minds—not the sugar, fat, fruits, vegetables, or protein—that controlled not only how they subjectively felt after drinking the sha...
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The lens through which we view the world affects everything from learning to health to longevity to our hormonal response to “different” milkshakes.
“growth mindset.”
those with growth mindsets progressed significantly faster than their fixed-mindset peers.
fixed-mindset
by the very nature of a fixed mindset, are those who have fixed mindsets inherently stuck with them? Or is there a way to change people’s minds?
At the end of the course, the vast majority of students who had previously felt that their abilities were fixed shifted their outlooks.
If we cultivate a growth mindset and believe that skills come from struggle, then we are more likely to expose ourselves to the good kind of growth-promoting stress.
