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Timebox your day. The three life domains of you, relationships, and work provide a framework for planning how to spend your time.
Reflect and refine. Revise your schedule regularly, but you must commit to it once it’s set.
Chapter 10 Control the Inputs, Not the Outcomes
Exercise, sleep, healthy meals, and time spent reading or listening to an audiobook are all ways to invest in ourselves. Some people value mindfulness, spiritual connection, or reflection, and may want time to pray or meditate. Others value skillfulness and want time alone to practice a hobby.
Schedule time for yourself first. You are at the center of the three life domains. Without allocating time for yourself, the other two domains suffer. • Show up when you say you will. You can’t always control what you get out of time you spend, but you can control how much time you put into a task. • Input is much more certain than outcome. When it comes to living the life you want, making sure you allocate time to living your values is the only thing you should focus on.
Chapter 11 Schedule Important Relationships
The people we love most should not be content getting whatever time is left over. Everyone benefits when we hold time on our schedule to live up to our values and do our share.
The people you love deserve more than getting whatever time is left over. If someone is important to you, make regular time for them on your calendar. • Go beyond scheduling date days with your significant other. Put domestic chores on your calendar to ensure an equitable split. • A lack of close friendships may be hazardous to your health. Ensure you maintain important relationships by scheduling time for regular get-togethers.
Chapter 12 Sync with Stakeholders at Work
Syncing your schedule with stakeholders at work is critical for making time for traction in your day. Without visibility into how you spend your time, colleagues and managers are more likely to distract you with superfluous tasks.
Sync as frequently as your schedule changes. If your schedule template changes from day to day, have a daily check-in. However, most people find a weekly alignment is sufficient.
Part 3 Hack Back External Triggers
Chapter 13 Ask the Critical Question
The Fogg Behavior Model states that for a behavior (B) to occur, three things must be present at the same time: motivation (M), ability (A), and a trigger (T). More succinctly, B = MAT.
The more we respond to external triggers, the more we train our brain in a never-ending stimulus–response loop.
External triggers often lead to distraction. Cues in our environment like the pings, dings, and rings from devices, as well as interruptions from other people, frequently take us off track.
External triggers aren’t always harmful. If an external trigger leads us to traction, it serves us.
We must ask ourselves: Is this trigger serving me, or am I serving it? Then we can hack back the external triggers that don’t serve us.
Chapter 14 Hack Back Work Interruptions
Interruptions lead to mistakes. You can’t do your best work if you’re frequently distracted. • Open-office floor plans increase distraction. • Defend your focus. Signal when you do not want to be interrupted. Use a screen sign or some other clear cue to let people know you are indistractable.
Chapter 15 Hack Back Email
To receive fewer emails, we must send fewer emails.
There’s mounting evidence that processing your email in batches is much more efficient and less stress inducing than checking it throughout the day.
Break down the problem. Time spent on email (T) is a function of the number of messages received (n) multiplied by the average time (t) spent per message: T = n × t. • Reduce the number of messages received. Schedule office hours, delay when messages are sent, and reduce time-wasting messages from reaching your inbox. • Spend less time on each message. Label emails by when each message needs a response. Reply to emails during a scheduled time on your calendar.
Chapter 16 Hack Back Group Chat
Real-time communication channels should be used sparingly. Time spent communicating should not come at the sacrifice of time spent concentrating. • Company culture matters. Changing group chat practices may involve questioning company norms. We’ll discuss this topic in part five. • Different communication channels have different uses. Rather than use every technology as an always-on channel, use the best tools for the job.
Get in and get out. Group chat is great for replacing in-person meetings but terrible if it becomes an all-day affair.
Chapter 17 Hack Back Meetings
If we are going to spend our time in a meeting, we must make sure that we are present, both in body and mind.
Make it harder to call a meeting. To call a meeting, the organizer must circulate an agenda and briefing document. • Meetings are for consensus building. With few exceptions, creative problem-solving should occur before the meeting, individually or in very small groups. • Be fully present. People use devices during meetings to escape monotony and boredom, which subsequently makes meetings even worse. • Have one laptop per meeting. Devices in everyone’s hands makes it more difficult to achieve the purpose of the meeting. With the exception of one laptop in the room for presenting
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Chapter 18 Hack Back Your Smartphone
You can hack back the external triggers on your phone in four steps and in less than one hour. • Remove: Uninstall the apps you no longer need.
Replace: Shift where and when you use potentially distracting apps, like social media and YouTube, to your desktop instead of on your phone. Get a wristwatch so you don’t have to look at your phone for the time. • Rearrange: Move any apps that may trigger mindless checking from your phone’s home screen. • Reclaim: Change the notification settings for each app. Be very selective regarding which apps can send you sound and sight cues. Learn to use your phone’s Do Not Disturb settings.
Chapter 19 Hack Back Your Desktop
Desktop clutter takes a heavy psychological toll on your attention. Clearing away external triggers in your digital workspace can help you stay focused. • Turn off desktop notifications. Disabling notifications on your computer ensures you won’t get distracted by external triggers while doing focused work.
Chapter 20 Hack Back Online Articles
Online articles are full of potentially distracting external triggers. Open tabs can pull us off course and tend to suck us down a time-wasting content vortex. • Make a rule. Promise yourself you’ll save interesting content for later by using an app like Pocket.
Surprise! You can multitask. Use multichannel multitasking like listening to articles while working out or taking walking meetings.
Chapter 21 Hack Back Feeds
Feeds, like the ones we scroll through on social media, are designed to keep you engaged. Feeds are full of external triggers that can drive us to distraction.
Take control of feeds by hacking back. Use free browser extensions like News Feed Eradicator for Facebook, Newsfeed Burner, Open Multiple Websites, and DF Tube to remove distracting external triggers. (Links to all these services and more are available at NirAndFar.com/Indistractable.)
Part 4 Prevent Distraction with Pacts
Chapter 22 The Power of Precommitments
Being indistractable does not only require keeping distraction out. It also necessitates reining ourselves in. • Precommitments can reduce the likelihood of distraction. They help us stick with decisions we’ve made in advance. • Precommitments should only be used after the other three indistractable strategies have already been applied. Don’t skip the first three steps.
Chapter 23 Prevent Distraction with Effort Pacts
An effort pact prevents distraction by making unwanted behaviors more difficult to do.
An effort pact prevents distraction by making unwanted behaviors more difficult to do. • In the age of the personal computer, social pressure to stay on task has largely disappeared. No one can see what you’re working on, so it’s easier to slack off. Working next to a colleague or friend for a set period of time can be a highly effective effort pact.
You can use tech to stay off tech. Apps like SelfControl, Forest, and Focusmate can help you make effort pacts.
Chapter 24 Prevent Distraction with Price Pacts
“people are typically more motivated to avoid losses than to seek gains.” Losing hurts more than winning feels good. This irrational tendency, known as “loss aversion,” is a cornerstone of behavioral economics.
