Day 68: Deep Work in a Shallow World

Remember when thinking was just... thinking? Not this strange hybrid activity where your brain bounces between a spreadsheet, your phone, and wondering if that weird noise from your refrigerator means it's finally giving up on life?

I miss those days. I genuinely do. Days when "multitasking" wasn't a badge of honour but correctly identified as "doing several things poorly at once."

Cal Newport, in his book "Deep Work," defines it as "Professional activities performed in a state of distraction-free concentration that push your cognitive capabilities to their limit." In other words, the thing we're all supposedly paid to do but rarely get the chance to actually do.

The irony isn't lost on me that I'm writing this while fighting the urge to check my emails. Not my proudest moment, but at least I'm self-aware about my dysfunction.

The Notification Apocalypse

The average person checks their phone 96 times a day. That's once every 10 minutes. If this was a medical condition, we'd have telethons raising money for research.

"For what shall it profit a man, if he shall gain the whole world, but lose his own soul?" - Mark 8:36 (KJV)

Or updated for 2025: "For what shall it profit a knowledge worker, if they shall respond to all emails promptly, but never complete anything of actual value?"

I read a study from Microsoft that found it takes an average of 23 minutes and 15 seconds to fully recover from an interruption. Do the maths. With 96 phone checks a day, we're essentially spending our entire existence in a state of partial attention.

Let that sink in. We've designed a world where sustained concentration has become virtually impossible, then wonder why anxiety rates are skyrocketing and productivity is plummeting.

Brilliant work, humans. Absolutely brilliant.

The Myth of Multitasking 

There's this persistent myth that some people are naturally gifted multitaskers. Like some sort of cognitive superpower that allows them to simultaneously draft a quarterly report while attending a Zoom meeting and ordering groceries online.

Spoiler alert: They're not. They're just equally rubbish at several things simultaneously.

According to neuroscientist Daniel Levitin, what we call multitasking is actually "task-switching" - rapidly moving between different tasks. And each switch depletes neural resources.

It's like having twenty browser tabs open on a computer with limited RAM. Everything... just... gets... slower.

I tried an experiment last week. One full day of single-tasking. No phone during focused work. No email checking between tasks. Just one thing at a time, completed before moving to the next.

The result? I finished my day's work by 2 PM. TWO IN THE BLOODY AFTERNOON.

Of course, I then proceeded to waste the rest of the day scrolling through Twitter, but that's beside the point. Baby steps, people. Baby steps.

The Monastic Approach (Without the Annoying Vows)

In ancient times, monks would seclude themselves in monasteries to contemplate spiritual matters without worldly distractions. They understood something we've forgotten: profound thought requires profound quiet.

"Be still, and know that I am God." - Psalm 46:10 (NIV)

There's wisdom in stillness. Clarity in quiet. Productivity in focus.

Now, I'm not suggesting we all shave our heads and take vows of silence (though honestly, a week without hearing about celebrity gossip sounds rather appealing). But what if we created modern-day "monasteries" within our chaotic lives?

Newport suggests four "depths" of deep work, from the monastic (complete isolation for extended periods) to the rhythmic (regular deep work sessions). For most of us mere mortals with jobs and families and Netflix subscriptions, the rhythmic approach is most feasible.

Block off 90-minute chunks. Turn everything off. And I mean EVERYTHING. Then dive deep into one task. It's like interval training for your brain.

And just like at the gym, it hurts at first. Your mind will scream for the dopamine hit of a notification. Your fingers will twitch toward the phone. But eventually, like a toddler whose tantrum is ignored, it will settle down and focus.

The Athens Method 

Socrates didn't have an iPhone. Plato never had to deal with Slack notifications. Yet they managed to develop philosophical frameworks that still influence thinking thousands of years later.

How? They walked and talked. They engaged in focused conversation without digital interruption. They thought deeply because there was nothing else to do.

When was the last time you were truly bored? Properly, staring-at-the-ceiling, mind-wandering bored? For me, it was probably 2007.

Boredom is the soil in which creativity grows. Without it, our ideas remain shallow, our thoughts undeveloped.

This reminds me of the ancient tale of Archimedes, who solved his famous buoyancy principle while taking a bath. The "Eureka" moment didn't come during a Zoom call or while checking emails. It came during unstructured thinking time.

I've started taking what I call "Athenian walks" - 30 minutes, no phone, no podcasts, just walking and thinking. The results have been surprising. Problems that seemed insurmountable suddenly have obvious solutions. Creative ideas emerge unexpectedly.

Also, I've discovered my neighbourhood has trees. Who knew?

In closing

So here's my challenge to you (and to myself, let's be honest): Create a sanctuary for your concentration. Protect it fiercely. Treat your attention as the finite, precious resource it is.

Because in a world designed to fragment our focus, the ability to concentrate deeply isn't just a competitive advantage, it's an act of rebellion.

And quite frankly, a bit of rebellion is exactly what we need.

Because This is What We Do NOW!