Highlights first synced by [[readwise]] [[September 2nd, 2020]]

• The right solution for you will always be personal—an idiosyncratic combination of strategies based on your own work demands, habits, and preferences. (Location 72)
• when folks want to talk creativity, what they’re really seeking is help with execution, ways to take action more effectively. (Location 100)
• While no workplace is perfect, it turns out that our gravest challenges are a lot more primal and personal. (Location 103)
• blocking off a large chunk of time every day for creative work on your own priorities, with the phone and e-mail off. (Location 162)
• Stick to the same tools, the same surroundings, even the same background music, so that they become associative triggers for you to enter your creative zone. (Location 178)
• Train yourself to record every commitment you make (to yourself or others) somewhere that will make it impossible to forget. (Location 187)
• Set a start time and a finish time for your workday—even if you work alone. Dedicate different times of day to different activities: creative work, meetings, correspondence, administrative work, and so on. (Location 190)
• You’re much more likely to spot surprising relationships and to see fresh connections among ideas, if your mind is constantly humming with issues related to your work. (Location 215)
• Frequency keeps the pressure off. (Location 220)
• “What I do every day matters more than what I do once in a while.” (Location 255)
• The strategy is simple, I think. The strategy is to have a practice, and what it means to have a practice is to regularly and reliably do the work in a habitual way. (Location 273)
• you are only going to become a professional if you do it when you don’t feel like it. And that emotional waiver is why this is your work and not your hobby. (Location 278)
• understanding that being creative means that you have to sell your ideas. (Location 282)
• Whereas I know tons of people who call themselves artists who were born with talents and never really had to push themselves to be good at it. They think they are entitled to make a living at this thing, but they are not willing to do the hard part—selling—that everyone finds hard. (Location 287)
• The reason you might be having trouble with your practice in the long run—if you were capable of building a practice in the short run—is nearly always because you are afraid. (Location 291)
• It’s much easier to whine and sabotage yourself and blame the client, the system, and the economy. This is what you hide from—the noise in your head that says you are not good enough, that says it is not perfect, that says it could have been better. (Location 301)
• sleep is more important than food. (Location 341)
• You can go a week without eating and the only thing you’ll lose is weight. (Location 342)
  • Note: bullshit
• He focuses for sixty to ninety minutes on the challenge he believes has the greatest likelihood of adding long-term value. (Location 369)
• What he now understands is that when he builds renewal into his day—when he establishes the right rhythms—everything in his life works better. (Location 373)
• A great option for the night owls among us is to use the late-night hours for solitude and distraction-free space. If you work best at night, you can find solitude by scheduling a block of time to work alone after dark. (Location 401)
• One amazing way to practice is a simple meditation session once a day. Meditation doesn’t have to be mystical or complicated: at heart, it’s simply sitting and doing nothing else for at least a few minutes. A great place to build this into your daily routine is as soon as you wake up—get up, drink some water, and then sit and meditate for five, ten, or even twenty minutes before you start your day. How do you meditate? Find a quiet space and sit. Stay upright, keep your eyes open but not focused on anything in particular, and breathe through your nose. Start by noticing your posture, your body. Then focus your attention on your breath, as it comes in and out of your body. Notice your thoughts coming up, acknowledge them, but don’t engage with them. Always return your attention to your breath. Keep doing this for at least a few minutes, and you’re done. What’s the point of sitting? There is no point—sitting is the point. You’re not doing it to reduce stress, gain enlightenment, or learn more about yourself—though all these things might happen—but to practice just sitting. In doing so, you are practicing being alone, and doing nothing but what you’re doing. This is essential. (Location 405)
• a wealth of information creates a poverty of attention.” (Location 440)
• In a world filled with distraction, attention is our competitive advantage. Look at each day as a challenge—and an opportunity—to keep your eye on the prize. (Location 448)
• In a business environment, people will resort to whatever makes their life easier—like firing off e-mails to subordinates at the drop of a hat—until someone higher up demands that a particular behavior stops. (Location 463)
• exactly how much the behavior is costing the organization. (Location 465)
  • Note: what abkit these big prrjeexf metkkibfs? what ckould we do diffefrenty to avoid wasrin time whhleetil gttib valuabble informaatjon to lour mmanaager?
• Start with small blocks of focused time and then gradually work yourself up to longer durations. A good rule of thumb is to begin with an hour at a time, then add fifteen minutes to each session every two weeks. The key, however, is to never allow distraction. If you give in and quickly check Facebook, cancel the whole block and try again later. Your mind can never come to believe that even a little bit of distraction is okay during these blocks. (Location 497)
• The amount of value lost to unchecked use of convenient but distracting work habits is staggering. The focus block method described above does not fix this problem, but it does give you a way to push back against its worst excesses, (Location 507)
• It can feel as though we’re super-efficiently doing two or more things at once. But in fact we’re just doing one thing, then another, then back again, with significantly less skill and accuracy than if we had simply focused on one job at a time. (Location 525)
• The very act of resisting temptations eats up concentration and leaves you mentally depleted. (Location 544)
• No matter how much we think we’re in control, our brains have their own agenda. (Location 552)
• research has shown that the unfinished morning task could linger in your mind like a mental itch, adversely affecting your performance later on—an effect that psychologists call “attentional residue”. (Location 554)
• If you can, it’s best to find a good stopping point on a project—one that frees your mind from nagging questions—before moving on to another task. That way, you’ll find it easier to achieve mental closure and apply all your energy to the next challenge. (Location 566)
• random reinforcement, (Location 600)
• Maybe every day we make a new version of a document we are working on so that we can keep a visible record of our progress? (Location 641)
• Write down every invading and negatively distracting thought and schedule a ten-minute review session later in the day to focus on these anxieties and lay them to rest. (Location 669)
• Be aware of the cost of constant connection. (Location 764)
• Recognize when you’re tuning in to the stream for the wrong reasons. (Location 766)
• Create windows of non-stimulation in your day. (Location 768)
• Is it necessary to share this? Will it add value to my life and for other people? Can I share this experience later so I can focus on living it now? Am I looking for validation? Is there something I could do to validate myself? Am I avoiding something I need to do instead of addressing why I don’t want to do it? Am I feeling bored? Is there something else I could do to feel more purposeful and engaged in my day? Am I feeling lonely? Have I created opportunities for meaningful connection in my day? Am I afraid of missing out? Is the gratification of giving in to that fear worth missing out on what’s in front of me? Am I overwhelming myself, trying to catch up? Can I let go of yesterday’s conversation and join today’s instead? Can I use this time to simply be instead of looking for something to do to fill it? Do I just want to have mindless fun for a while? (That last one is perfectly valid—so long as we know what we’re doing, and we consciously choose to do it.) (Location 901)
• This typically means that I end up doing nothing—and feeling horribly guilty about procrastinating—until I have no other choice but to begin. This forces me to proceed at a frantic pace, staying up all hours of the night and neglecting almost everything else. I’m so frustrated because I know I could do a better job if I had just started sooner. (Location 1356)
• If someone points out a mistake, has a different opinion, mentions something I didn’t include, or has anything other than incredibly positive things to say about a piece, I feel embarrassed and like a total failure. I worry that my expertise and respect is in question and that others will think I’m incompetent and an impostor. The Creative Pragmatist Approach: I appreciate feedback because it helps me to test and refine my work. I may agree or disagree with the input and I can choose how I respond to it. If I never open myself up to others’ insights, I might miss out on something really wonderful. My work is improved and my world is expanded through the input of others. (Location 1387)
• Take a leaf out of Twain’s book. Look out for the telltale signs that your tank is empty, and use them as a cue to take a break and let your unconscious take the strain. Relax or apply yourself to a completely different type of project. You may not have two years to set your project aside if a deadline is looming, but even a short break can work wonders when you’re running low on inspiration. (Location 1427)
• PRACTICE UNNECESSARY CREATION Use personal creative projects to explore new obsessions, skills, or ways of working in a low-pressure environment. (Location 1493)
• WANDER LONELY AS A CLOUD Make time for your mind—and body—to wander when you’re stuck. Disengaging from the problem allows your subconscious to do its work. (Location 1495)