While I don’t always agree with what Cal Newport thinks - for instance, I take issue with his assertion that literary fiction authors can spend all day in deep work when, in my experience as an actual practitioner of an approximation thereof, I can report that that is rarely the case (a dream, certainly, but not a reality), as well as his use of the term “winners” - I admire how and that he thinks.
I’ve also found his timeblocking method useful, particularly for the addition of intention throughout the day - especially in my afternoons of the nebulous drift. But, in applying these ideas to my day, I’ve also modified them to suit me a bit better: not necessarily “deep” and “shallow” work, but “solitary” and “open” work.
Blocks for my timed bits of solitude - writing, reading, running, yoga / meditation (yes, I’ve returned; I didn’t like how quick my temper became without it; I require daily training in pausing and space) - and lines for the open times, those times when I’m doing things for or with others - yardcare, housework, admin; I need my walls in the times of solitude, be it bookcases and the darkness of pre-dawn, or vast open swaths of me, myself, and I - but my open times are intentionally that.
The day, being then, the optimal interaction between intentional closed and open times, inhales and exhales - or something like that.
