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For today: Cool hidden jobs and how to develop your productivity superpower

"To be able, at any moment, to sacrifice what you are for what you will become."

  - Eric Thomas

Monotasking is a Game-Changer

TL;DR: TikTok will ruin your brain

I realized I had a serious problem within 5 minutes of starting to read DEEP WORK by Cal Newport. On the table in front of me sat two phones, two open laptops, and a notebook. I also had food in one hand and the book in the other. How could anyone expect to be productive while surrounded by so many distractions competing for their attention?

We often feel more productive when we multitask, but that's an illusion. The feeling of productivity comes from the mental effort we're exerting, but much of that effort is lost to what's called, "context switching." Context switching is the time and energy it takes you to remember what you were doing right before you responded to a text, for example. Depending on how complicated our work is, and how many distractions we're fighting, the majority of our productive potential can be lost to context switching alone.

Sometimes we feel like getting back to people right away is the most-efficient thing we can do when it's actually the least-efficient.

As leaders, we also have to help our teams understand this and trust them to get back to us when it makes the most sense for them.

Imagine someone solving a complex math problem or writing a mind-bending block of code. They have to carry their logic through from the beginning to the end of that piece of work. Any momentary loss of concentration could require them to completely start over. The same principle is true for every piece of work we do even if we don't always have to start from scratch.

Consider James Michener, who wrote 40 of the longest books ever written. Many are around 1,000 pages, and I consider just reading three of them to be one of my greatest lifetime achievements.

Somehow, James Michener's books are both historically accurate and fictionally captivating across several eras and cultures. How could so much original storytelling come from one mind, though? In short, he learned to focus for extended periods of time. He spent 15 hours a day at his typewriter for weeks without ever scrolling Insta, checking his DMs, or responding to texts.

Yes, it helped that those didn't yet exist, but you get the point. His powers of focus were so upgraded that he could effortlessly construct interwoven narratives as fast as he could type them out.

I don't know about you, but I'd love to effortlessly crank out bestsellers.

We live in an "attention economy" as GaryVee says. Millions of marketers and salespeople are deploying every principle of human psychology, every AI tool, and every A|B test they can think of to get you to stop and pay attention to them for more than 2.2 seconds. That's the average attention given to a print ad. Digitally, an estimated 5.3 trillion ads are displayed online every year. Because of this constant content overload, we've literally wired our brains to think in fragments.

In his book, Moonwalking with Einstein, Joshua Foer explains how anyone can harness their mental faculties to achieve incredible feats of memorization. He proved that anyone could improve their memory by memorizing 28 shuffled decks of cards in under an hour.

One of the principles he highlights is extreme focus. He wore glasses with pinholes to see out of and put on industrial ear protection to avoid any possible distractions. Over weeks and months of practice, his powers of recall consistently improved.

If we want extreme mental clarity to achieve our creative and productive potential, then we must learn to think deeply again. We must rebuild our attention span for long periods of distraction-free work. We must train ourselves to focus the right way. 

I wear my hat and Bose noise-canceling headphones without any music while sitting in a dark office to write. I leave my phone in the car. Nothing exists except for me and my thoughts. Sometimes it takes a minute to get in the zone, but after that it's pure productivity.

My challenge to you is to pursue that level of focus. No white noise. No interruptions. Just you and the clearest thoughts you've ever had.

Whether you're hitting the books in grad school or writing a novel, cultivate the habit of ruthlessly eliminating distractions to reach your cerebral potential. That might feel uncomfortable at first, but the ability to think deeply is truly a superpower in today's world of shattered consciousness.

Cool Jobs:

Each week, we’ll share some interesting job opportunities you probably won't find anywhere else.

Game Design/QA Intern (Winter-Spring)

• Pursuing a Bachelor's or Master's in Game Design, Computer Science, or related field

• On-site in Redwood City, CA

• 6-month internship

• Learn More Here

VP of Product for all-electric mobile power and energy storage

• Must have 6+ years of experience in energy storage and/or electric vehicles

• On site in Richmond, CA

• Learn More Here

Executive Assistant for the President of Harvard University's Chief of Staff

• Minimum of 5 years relevant work experience

• Hybrid in Cambridge, MA

• 66 to 108k plus excellent benefits

• Learn More Here

Private Sector Engagement for Animal Health Non-Profit

• Must have strong experience with animal health or agriculture in Africa

• 6-month contract (part time)

• On-site in Kenya

• £900 per day.

• Email us at [email protected] to learn more. 

Interim CTO for Subscription-based pharma company.

• Must have science-based subscription or pharma experience.

• Fully remote.

• 3 to 6-month contract

• $1,400 per day.

• Email us at [email protected] to learn more.

Operations Assessment for Pediatric Therapy Org

• Must be a Healthcare operations expert. Preferably out-patient care.

• Occasionally on site in Florida

• 3-month contract

• $1,200 per day

• Email us at [email protected] to learn more.

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