Do I Need More Discipline? | Monday Advice
4/20/20261 hr 27 min
Is developing discipline one of the most effective bulwarks against the constant flood of distraction we face daily? And if so, what’s the best way to accomplish this goal? In this Monday Advice episode of the show, Cal Newport investigates these questions with the help of Brad Stulberg, who writes about these ideas in his most recent book, the New York Times bestseller “The Way of Excellence.” Below are the questions covered in today's episode (with their timestamps). Get your questions answered by Cal! Send an email to podcast@calnewport.com. Video from today’s episode: youtube.com/calnewportmedia INTERVIEW: Do I Need More Discipline? (w/ Brad Stulberg) [2:27] INBOX:
- Dealing with abundance of choice in media [1:07:33]
- Using typewriters for first drafts [1:11:45]
- Success with “information walkabout” [1:14:44] WHAT CAL IS UP TO:
- What I’ve been doing [1:17:22]
- What I’ve been reading [1:19:54] Books: A World Appears (Michael Pollan) Links: Buy Cal’s latest book, “Slow Productivity” at www.calnewport.com/slow Get a signed copy of Cal’s “Slow Productivity” at https://peoplesbooktakoma.com/event/cal-newport/ Cal’s monthly book directory: bramses.notion.site/059db2641def4a88988b4d2cee4657ba? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PdvqpqHSQas Thanks to our Sponsors: https://www.cozyearth.com/deep (Use code “DEEP”) https://www.monarch.com (Use code “DEEP”) https://www.shopify.com/deep https://www.drinkag1.com/deep Thanks to Jesse Miller for mastering and production, Jay Kerstens for the intro music, and Nate Mechler for research and newsletter. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
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First 90 secondsSpeaker 10:00
[upbeat music] Ambition comes in all shapes and sizes. At First Citizens Bank, we roll with your goals because we're built for what you're building. Fit for your ambition, First Citizens Bank.
Cal Newport· Host0:14
Tell me if this sounds familiar. You have some ambitious plan for meaningful or productive things that you want to accomplish, but then your phone enters the scene, and the next thing you know, the day is over, lost in a blur of digital slop. So I've been interested recently in a potentially powerful strategy for pushing back on this distraction monster, becoming a more disciplined person. All right, now let me be more specific about my hypothesis here. Here's what I think is true. Um, if you can cultivate a standout disciplined pursuit in your life, something hard that you can come back to again and again, then this specific discipline will rewire your brain in a general way so that resisting distractions becomes massively easier. Now, this idea is super compelling to me, but is it accurate? And if it is, how do you actually maximize your chances of succeeding with putting it into practice? Well, these seem like the perfect questions to ask in a Monday Advice episode of this show, so that is what we're gonna do today. Now, here's my plan. To help me find answers, I'm gonna be joined by my good friend and friend of the show, Brad Stulberg. Brad has an excellent chapter in