Brian Johnson explores Cal Newport's idea: stop taking breaks from distraction and start taking breaks from focus instead. He shares his own practice of 4.2 hours of uninterrupted deep work before checking tech, and describes leaving his phone at home to bowl with his kids.
Hi, this is Brian. Welcome back to another Heroic one and at last plus one. We talked about one of the inspiring quotes I found in the Heroic app as part of my am Ritual Protocol. As you may recall, that quote was from seneca. Almost exactly 2,000 years ago. He told us, cherish some person of great character and keep them always in mind. Then live as if they were watching you in order all your actions as if they saw them insert head exploding emoji. That's a high standard. That's also why I have my heroes on my wall. Quick check in. Who is your person of great character? Did you bring them to mind? Did you ask them what they think you should be thinking about today? Then did you keep them always in mind? Did you live as if they were watching you? Did you order all your actions as if they are seeing them? Of course, he can't do that perfectly. But I can assure you the version of you that does the stuff we discuss, even just 1 to 10% of it, will outperform the version of you that doesn't. But only every single time period, right? I mean, it's not debatable Right now. Today I want to chat about the second quote I saw during my morning Ritual Protocol quote feast. It's a brilliant gem from Cal Newport's equally brilliant book DeBoerc. Professor Newport tells us, don't take breaks from distraction, Instead take breaks from focus. Got goosebumps typing and saying that. I repeat, don't take breaks from distraction to go deep. Instead, take breaks from focus to allow distractions in. In other words, don't spend most of your time on the hamster wheel of digital stimulation, responding to inputs all day, every day, with rare moments in which you turn off your phone to go deep, whether that's focused on work or focused on love. Do the opposite. Make your default mode the version of you that's focused on work and or love and take breaks from that deep focus living to allow tech inputs in. Easier said than done, of course. And we will all have our own idiosyncratic expressions of what that idea looks like, of course. And that's today's plus one. I repeat, don't take breaks from distraction. Instead take breaks from focus. And I ask how can you turn off your smartphone and go deep just a little more today, get on that hero little. P.S. i type that on a Sunday afternoon. After connecting with the family that morning, I hammered 4.2 hours of deep work before I allowed any tech inputs into my consciousness. And it's always astonishing to me how much I can get done before I allow inputs into my consciousness and how little truly creative work I can get done after I've allowed tech inputs into my consciousness. Which is why creative before reactive is one of the most important heroic targets I hit every day. And now it's time for some deep love time. I was thinking about bowling with the kids. I'll be leaving the main phone at home. Let's go. Bowling was fun, by the way. Recording this, obviously after I wrote it, it was awesome.
