172 Quotes by Cal Newport

Simply put, humans are not wired to be constantly wired.

The shallow work that increasingly dominates the time and attention of knowledge workers is less vital than it often seems in the moment.

What? You say that full energy given to those sixteen hours will lessen the value of the business eight? Not so. On the contrary, it will assuredly increase the value of the business eight. One of the chief things which my typical man has to learn is that the mental faculties are capable of a continuous hard activity; they do not tire like an arm or a leg. All they want is change – not rest, except in sleep.

A clean break is best. In.

To reestablish control, we need to move beyond tweaks and instead rebuild our relationship with technology from scratch, using our deeply held values as a foundation.

I keep a tally of the total number of hours I’ve spent that month in a state of deliberate practice.

You can’t, in other words, build a billion-dollar empire like Facebook if you’re wasting hours every day using a service like Facebook.

Hardness scares off the daydreamers and the timid, leaving more opportunity for those like us who are willing to take the time to carefully work out the best path forward and then confidently take action.

No one owes you a great career, it argues; you.