Key Takeaways from ‘Deep Work’ by Cal Newport
Leave the distracted masses. Join the focused few.
I finally got my hands on a book that came highly recommended from multiple sources — and I devoured it like a starving woman feasting on her first meal.
Here’s my take on it: Deep Work by Cal Newport isn’t for everyone.
There, I said it.
It’s a book that teaches you how to leave the distracted masses and join the focused few.
And if you’ve been wanting to make the leap from a dreamer to a doer, then this book is for you.
The good news is that there’s no time better than the quarantine and all the free resources that come with it to pick up a copy and give it a read.
Cal Newport is a professor at Georgetown University who lives up to his professorship; No playing around with fancy words and metaphors, no beating around the bush.
He instead uses his solid academic background to get his hard-hitting points across.
With research findings, observations and his own life experiences, he cleverly articulates what sets the focused few apart from the distracted masses.
It is, in fact, deep work that took him from publishing two peer-reviewed papers a year to nine a year — a rapid ascent that not even he was prepared for.
Intriguingly, around the same time, he wrote Deep Work; a New York Times Best-selling book and welcomed a second child into his family.
There’s more.
His workday ended at 5.30 pm sharp. He never overworked himself.
Now, if you are a person who works around the clock, day in and day out, you might have to check this book out.
Because in Deep Work, you’ll be reading the product of Newport’s deep work. His tools could be the stepping stone to your career success.
I’ve listed down some of my favorite tools I believe could yield great results.
- The Bimodal Philosophy of Deep Work — Allocate chunks of your time for deep and shallow work separately.
- The Rhythmic Philosophy — Stick to rituals and create a rhythm that will eventually demand less of your limited willpower reserves.
- The Grand Gesture — Trick your brain into increasing the importance of a task by making drastic changes to your environment.
- Unconscious Thought Theory (UTT) — Wire your subconscious to think through problems without even realizing it.
- Attention Restoration Theory (ART) — Spend time with nature or do lighthearted activities to improve your ability to concentrate.
- The Shut-down Ritual — End your workday at the same time every day and buy your mind the downtime it needs to unwind.
- Productive Meditation — Stick to a regular physical exercise or activity and use that time to think through one specific problem or thing.
- Sender Filter — Respect your time and filter out the people who could contact you.
If this review has helped you in any way, let’s do this thing where we share what helps us with at least one person we love!
Note: This will be the first of many book reviews to come.
