Make Time

Choose and note your highlight the evening before if you can, otherwise over breakfast, in a notebook or on a Post-it.

Once you have picked something that matters, returning to it every day helps that activity take root, grow, and develop.

If you feel a conflict between competing priorities: list them, pick the most meaningful one, then keep going.

Not prioritising the thing you're most committed to isn't neglecting it. It's being honest with yourself about where your focus actually needs to go.

Combine the small tasks and handle them in a single highlight session.

Might-do list (what could you do?) → Highlight (which one matters most?) → Calendar (what's the plan?)

Big project | Small project | Everything else.

"If it doesn't fit on this page, it won't fit in your life."

Do the different pieces of a project on consecutive days. Far more efficient than pulling the file out of the archive, opening it, remembering where you were, working, and then reaching for something else.

How much time does it need?

When do I want to do it?

Put it on the calendar.

If you can't start the day with an empty calendar, use daily "do not schedule anything here" blocks to make room for your highlight.

Shorten meetings to open up gaps.

Pile meetings onto specific days of the week.

Ask yourself what you could cancel.

Be honest, explain why you can't come, and let it go.

Your default answer should be updated to "no."

Be kind but honest.

The Sour Patch tactic: sour on the outside, sweet on the inside.

Designing the whole day can unlock another level.

Start the day with light, coffee, and something to do.

Design your nights in advance.

Be honest with yourself about how much sleep you need and how much you actually get: "It's usually society, not your body, that dictates your default bedtime."

Recharge first: read, watch something, exercise.

Go offline.

Don't forget to slow down; shut your mind off gradually.

Create a shutdown time (9pm?).

Check on your highlight as the shutdown time approaches.

If you did it, wonderful; if you didn't, look at why, and be content with what you did instead.

Delete the social apps.

Delete the other infinity pools.

Delete the email app and remove the account from the device.

Remove the web browser.

Keep everything else.

Don't "remember me on this device." Don't stay signed in.

Turn notifications off in your phone's settings.

When nothing is left on the homescreen, look at it and ask: "do I really want to be distracted right now?"

Don't check the screen for the time and get lost in the notifications.

A useful tactic for creating an offline highlight.

When you wake up the day has just started, your brain is rested, and there's no reason yet to feel distracted. Enjoy that, and postpone the morning check-in as long as you can.

Find your kryptonite: the site or app you regret after a few minutes (and those minutes can stretch into hours).

If it's an app, delete it; if it's a site, block it.

Make it as hard as you can, and ignore it.

Stay away from the urgency breaking news manufactures.

Follow the news weekly.

Log out of your apps at the end of every day.

Close the extra tabs and windows.

Flights come with a heightened kind of focus.

If there's a screen in front of you, turn it off, and don't connect to the Wi-Fi.

The internet is the biggest infinity pool. When it's time for laser mode, disconnect.

For a short experiment, ask a friend to change your Wi-Fi password and keep it from you for a while.

An infinity pool that gets between you and your focus can take 45 minutes, an hour, or more.

Rest periods and meal breaks can create time craters too.

The real win is the highlight. The "things that need doing" that come out of infinity pools are a fake win if they stand in front of your highlight.

Every infinity pool served some purpose when you first started using it. Find that purpose and focus on it.

Define why you use a particular app.

Decide how much time you want to give it daily and weekly.

Is the app really the best way to serve that purpose?

Think about this not only for sports teams but for every community you follow obsessively.

You'll be less eager to say yes to every incoming request. You won't have the energy to write paragraphs when a simple answer will do.

Put email time on your calendar.

Let the people around you learn to limit their expectations about how you communicate.

Let go of the idea that you have to keep checking your inbox and reply to every new message immediately.

Not "as fast as possible" but "as fast as I can be."

Every time you check your email you're asking: does some random person need my time right now?

"I'm slow to reply because I need to prioritise a few important projects. If your message is urgent, text me or call."

You can still send email without email arriving on your phone.

"I'll be away this week without email access, but I'll get back to you when I return."

Laser mode matters on holiday too.

Closing the door, or wearing headphones even without music, tells both the other person and yourself: "everything I need to attend to is right here."

Setting an end time not just for obligations but for everything you want to finish becomes an external push toward completion.

If you're not sure where to start, break your highlight into small, doable pieces.

Make sure every item contains a verb.

Use a track you've conditioned yourself to as a way into the frequency of a particular kind of work.

Pick a different piece of music for each different kind of work.

Because time isn't visible, our brains struggle to measure and track it. Make time visible.

Researching tools for the work is always more tempting than the work itself, and it gives you the feeling of having done something. Stay away from it.

Paper improves focus: you can't browse on it, and you can't get stuck on the digital form of your notes.

On paper you can open up without formatting constraints; paper surfaces possibilities.

While you're focused on something, write down every nagging question about the infinity pools off to the side, and carry on.

Paying attention to your body quiets the voices in your head.

Boredom creates a chance to drift into your own mind, and that trip usually ends up somewhere interesting.

Bored people are much better at creative problem solving.

Being stuck is different from being bored: when you're bored there's nothing to do, but when you're stuck you know exactly what to do and your brain isn't sure how to process it.

The easiest way through is to do something else, but that steals from your highlight. Instead, just stay stuck: stare at the blank screen or page, and whatever happens, don't move your focus.

When you feel burnt out, don't eat yourself alive. Be compassionate.

Take real breaks during the day, and pick a highlight that helps you gather your energy back.

"The antidote to exhaustion is not rest… the antidote to exhaustion is wholeheartedness."

Staying in the moment, entering flow, focusing. All of it rests on wholeheartedness: giving yourself over and never pulling back. Dropping your caution and letting yourself care about the work.

Throw yourself into the moment, with excitement and sincerity.

Twenty minutes is enough to reach the mental, physical, and mood benefits of exercise.

Every day. Avoid doing none at all; anything is more than zero.

Walking is a philosophy; it can be used as zen time.

Cook.

Take the stairs.

Use a suitcase without wheels.

Use HIIT (high-intensity interval training).

Eat food, not too much, mostly plants.

Keep healthy snacks with you.

Put the salad on the plate first, and arrange everything else around it.

Being able to eat something doesn't always mean eating it.

Going hungry for set periods can be good for focus and mental clarity.

Choose high-quality snacks.

Snack when your body and brain need it, not just to be doing something.

Let dark chocolate be the only sweet thing you eat.

Your body releases plenty of cortisol in the morning to help you wake up naturally. The cortisol effect generally covers 8 to 9am; drinking coffee after it (around 9.30) can do more for your grogginess.

If you put off coffee until you feel tired, it's already too late: the adenosine has bound to the receptors.

Drink your coffee at least 30 minutes before you run out.

Wait until you're tired, take caffeine, and nap while it enters your bloodstream (about 15 minutes). Your brain clears the adenosine and you wake up with caffeine in your blood.

Use more frequent, lower doses instead of a sudden high dose.

Green tea can fill the gap in the habit of drinking something.

Time your caffeine so that you're alert exactly as your highlight begins.

Caffeine has a half-life of 5 to 6 hours. Optimise your intake accordingly.

Separate caffeine from sweets.

Our hunter-gatherer bodies feel more alive outdoors.

Meditation is a breathing exercise for the brain, rest for the brain.

Build a daily 10-minute meditation routine.

Having your own stereo universe is lovely, but let yourself be bored and give your brain time to rest in silence.

When you step away from work, try breaks with no screen in them.

Think of someone who gives you energy.

Go to the trouble of having a real conversation with them; there should be sound involved.

Check your energy level afterwards.

This way you're more likely to eat more healthily, more consciously, and with pleasure while someone sits across from you.

Stay away from devices and the news they keep delivering in the hours before sleep, when you don't want your mind speeding up.

Starting a few hours before dinner or your ideal bedtime, gradually dim the lights at home.

Napping scientifically makes you smarter.

Even 10 to 20 minutes of rest will do.

"Sleep debt" is a real thing.

Weekday or holiday: set your alarm for the same time every day.

Another person's needs can cost an incredible amount of emotional and physical energy.

It may look selfish, but in the long run looking after yourself is the only way to look after others.