Deep Work by Cal Newport is a book that means a lot to me. The main concept is that we often get stuck doing shallow work in life, and if we want to get something meaningful done, we have to be purposeful on how we approach and do our most important work.
So, I used the concepts of this book to launch a 20-day Deep Work experiment to learn the French language!
🎉📺 Watch the experiment here: https://youtu.be/IMgQ2-AJaLk
Here are a few of the main ideas:
- Learning something new requires intense levels of concentration.
- There’s high value in creating a learning/working space that supports your work. Cal calls these locations Deep Work Headquarters on his YouTube channel.
- Deep Work is demanding, and therefore exhausting. We only have a few hours a day of working at this level of intensity.
- There are other tools, like purposeful rest and embracing boredom, that are necessary for getting the most out of our Deep Woerk sessions.
- Consider making a grand gesture, which is to commit an investment of time, money, or resources to kickstart your Deep Work project. In this video, I created an experiment where I immersed myself in the French language for 4 hours a day over 20 days during my Christmas break. This is an example of a Grand Gesture that Cal Newport describes in his book.
I loved making this video. First, I love the French language, and second, I love Cal’s work. He’s a fascinating guy who takes his time to think well, and when he speaks, it’s almost always meaningful.
👋 Check out Cal’s YouTube channel here: https://www.youtube.com/@CalNewportMedia
📚Get a copy of Deep Work and the companion notebook here: https://edgewaterbookstore.com/collections/books/products/deep-work
Until tomorrow, read slowly – take notes – apply the ideas.
-Eddy
