"Deep Work"

COVID-19 has prevented us from going back to school and Andover has implemented remote learning techniques. In other words, there are no virtual class meetings of which attendance is required and all assignments for a particular course should take no more than 6 hours (a significant cut from the usual 10 hr load). To begin this term of history, my teacher asked us to read the introduction of the book Deep Work by Cal Newport. Until today, I’d never heard of this book but Newport’s introduction has convinced me to take a look at it sometime. Newport essentially argues that modern day work culture, which is filled with social networking distractions such as facebook and email, is leading to the production of shallow work since people rarely spend enough time alone thinking through problems and solutions. He argues that in this day and age, deep work, which entails hours of undisrupted work time, is becoming more rare while its value increases indefinitely. He provides examples such as Bill Gates, Mark Twain and JK Rowling who famously seclude themselves in silent places in order to ignite their best thinking potential. Upon reading this Deep Work’s introduction, my history teacher asked up to reflect upon whether we’ve actually ever truly engaged in deep work and under what conditions. He asked us to also consider new ideas to implement in an effort to gain more value-producing potential and what we’ve been doing so far. I quite liked my response to this discussion post so I’m sharing it below. 

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In writing this post, I aspire to be as frank as possible in my response: no route of consideration could possibly lead me to the conclusion that I’ve ever truly engaged in deep work. In fact, Cal Newport humbles himself in his belief “that [he][hasn’t] reached [his] full value-producing potential” (17). Nonetheless, I believe two factors, in particular, have helped me glimpse the experience of deep work of which Newport speaks. The first is interest and the second is impetus. On the history research paper last term, I remember locking myself in my room during the writing/polishing phase of my paper. I sat at my desk in Chase with a few days left before the paper was due and wrote from 5:45-9:00 PM. Time flew. I don’t think I could hide my surprise when I called my parents saying, wow, I just spent 3 hours writing my history paper! I believe writing that research paper was the closest (besides one English paper earlier in the fall) I ever got to what Newport calls “deep work.” What made the time fly was my sincere interest in the topic and the incentive to learn something more than likely relevant to my career in the future and turn in a piece of work that made me proud. Perhaps even that yearning to feel proud of my paper drove me closer to deep work.

It goes without saying that students naturally hone their studying skills with time. However, I don’t think I felt that my study skills improve in any tangible way until halfway through Upper fall. Since middle school, teachers have been telling us to take study breaks after 45-60 minutes of studying. Until Upper year, I’d always been using those study breaks to check my insta feed or play one song, which would unsurprisingly turn into 10 songs. This year, I made a swap. I kept Spotify to the gym and during those short study breaks, I would instead walk around the dorm/library, do a couple jumping jacks, or go stand outside. I believe this helped tremendously because my brain wasn’t focusing on something entirely new, such as someone’s vacation insta from Italy. Rather, my mind indirectly ruminated upon what I had left on the desk. A win-win: I got my break and my brain got hers too without utterly sidetracking. Even now, having incorporated this new trick, I still have trouble concentrating. For example, when I “watch” TV, it usually assumes the role of background noise while I browse Bloomingdales or something. Concentration has never been my strong suit unless I find interest and incentive. However, I am inspired to try something new upon reading the introduction to Deep Work. For all assignments, movies, articles, or books I try to consume, I’m going to commit myself to reading/watching/absorbing etc. for at least 15 minutes. I think after 15 minutes, I’ll naturally find myself more involved and focused on the material, rather than reaching for my phone before I’ve even begun to concentrate. I’m hoping this will improve the span and depth of my concentration periods so that I don’t “permanently reduce [my] capacity to perform deep work” (7). 

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And now I ask you: have you ever truly engaged in deep work and if so, under what conditions?