Why?

Key Insight

● Why?

○ Flow makes us happy! A day spent in deep work and focus releases happiness hormones, and makes us feel better and more productive.

○ Anything in life that we need to do requires focus, and that strong and deep focus for a long time. In absolutely all books and biographies this is mentioned as a key thing. Most successful people talk about the “manic” focus they had on what they did.

○ With artificial intelligence, “dull” tasks will be automated more and more, and deep work will have a much higher price. The ability to quickly master complex and new areas will be a key skill of the 21st century. Quick thinking will begin to lose value, and will be almost completely replaced by AI.

○ If you are in a high position in a company or running your own company, you actually do not earn from your “work” but from your decisions. The better your decisions, the better the outcomes for the company, and there are no good decisions without deep thinking.

○ If you are in harsh operations, where you have constant calls with clients, meetings or other interruptions, full-day flow is probably not an option for you, however in that case it would be best to split the day into two parts (not necessarily equal) and group similar activities. Mixing “fast” and “slow” thinking is actually the worst option.

○ It’s important to understand that we are responsible for creating perfect conditions for flow. Modern technology has brought progress and possibilities for great productivity, but also problems, and the irony is that it was easier to enter flow in the past, because there weren’t as many distractions as today. Our brains are used to “fun” and cheap dopamine on demand, and subconsciously push us to open social networks for at least a moment. Delete the app that takes you most time during the day and you’ll see what happens: without control you’ll unlock your phone and tap the place where the app icon was, and only then realize what happened...

○ Flow is a “muscle,” which means it can be trained. And while it may be hard to switch to flow at first, over time it will become easier and more natural.

○ One of the biggest illusions of modern times is “multitasking,” which is completely opposite of what we want, and actually helps us do worse and slower. The human brain is not optimized for multitasking, and it actually produces extremely frequent context switches, which are very inefficient, and shift our brain to “fast” thinking. The vast majority of people in modern times spend most of their time in total chaos. A few calls, a few emails, a few social networks, then a break, then gossip with colleagues, another call, a meeting, and the day passes, and they haven’t done anything and feel exhausted. Multitasking is the culprit! Instant replying to messages and real-time communication are prioritized over deep work, and this leaves long-term consequences for effectiveness.