• average knowledge worker now spends more than 60 percent of the workweek engaged in electronic communication and Internet searching, with close to 30 percent of a worker’s time dedicated to reading and answering e-mail alone.
• Deep work is not some nostalgic affectation of writers and early-twentieth-century philosophers. It’s instead a skill that has great value today.
  • The first has to do with learning. We have an information economy that’s dependent on complex systems that change rapidly.

it is valuable

• In this new economy, three groups will have a particular advantage: those who can work well and creatively with intelligent machines, those who are the best at what they do, and those with access to capital.
• Two Core Abilities for Thriving in the New Economy
  • The ability to quickly master hard things.
  • The ability to produce at an elite level, in terms of both quality and speed.

it is rare

• Many other ideas are being prioritized as more important than deep work in the business world serendipitous collaboration, rapid communication, and an active presence on social media.
• in the absence of clear indicators of what it means to be productive and valuable in their jobs, many knowledge workers turn back toward an industrial indicator of productivity: doing lots of stuff in a visible manner.

it is meaningful

• we live in an era where anything Internetrelated is understood by default to be innovative and necessary. Depth-destroying behaviors such as immediate e-mail responses and an active social media presence are lauded, while avoidance of these trends generates suspicion.

• what you choose to focus on exerts significant leverage on your attitude going forward.

• people were happier at work and less happy relaxing than they suspected. the more such flow experiences that occur in a given week, the higher the subject’s life satisfaction.

• Deep work is an activity well suited to generate a flow state

• The ability to concentrate intensely is a skill that must be trained.