Reinvent Yourself: How To Completely Change Your Life Before 2024

00:00:00.000 | How do I rebuild my life into something deeper?

00:00:05.000 | All right, so I'm gonna load up on the screen here,

00:00:09.660 | my notes, I'm gonna draw.

00:00:11.980 | So caveat emptor, Cal Newport's gonna try drawing.

00:00:14.720 | This never ends up being that beautiful.

00:00:16.800 | Be ready for it.

00:00:18.360 | If you're listening and you wanna watch

00:00:19.880 | what I'm drawing on the screen, this is episode 252.

00:00:23.400 | So go to youtube.com/calnewportmedia

00:00:26.440 | and look for episode 252,

00:00:28.760 | or go to thedeeplife.com and look for episode 252.

00:00:31.520 | I'll also do my best to narrate what I'm drawing

00:00:33.540 | for those who are just listening.

00:00:35.980 | All right, so what you'll see on the screen here

00:00:38.300 | is what I call the deep life stack.

00:00:42.520 | Right now I have it empty.

00:00:43.620 | We're gonna fill in the details as we go along.

00:00:46.900 | The stack has four different levels to it.

00:00:49.160 | I'll highlight those.

00:00:50.240 | You got level one, two, three, four.

00:00:52.600 | The way I'm conceptualizing the deep life stack

00:00:56.440 | is sequential.

00:00:58.020 | You start with developing the bottom layer of the stack.

00:01:01.720 | Then you move up to the second layer,

00:01:03.580 | then the third, then the fourth,

00:01:04.760 | and then we're gonna iterate,

00:01:05.680 | and we'll get into that soon.

00:01:07.480 | All right, so what happens on the first layer

00:01:09.280 | of the deep life stack?

00:01:11.300 | This is the first big change or breakthrough,

00:01:15.600 | I would say, I've had when thinking

00:01:17.080 | about the deep life more recently.

00:01:18.680 | What I'm gonna put at this bottom layer

00:01:20.640 | is gonna be discipline.

00:01:22.680 | That's gonna mean two things.

00:01:27.480 | But let me say what my goal is here.

00:01:31.020 | I'm realizing when it comes to cultivating

00:01:33.540 | a different type of life, any type of transformation,

00:01:36.000 | you have to first change your self-identification

00:01:39.500 | to be the type of person who is able

00:01:42.780 | to persist with things that are difficult

00:01:46.620 | in the moment in pursuit of a greater good down the line.

00:01:51.620 | And I think it's very easy for people like me

00:01:53.980 | who give advice for a living,

00:01:55.580 | who've been doing this for a long time,

00:01:56.980 | to take for granted that that's what we do already.

00:01:59.240 | But this is actually for most people,

00:02:01.080 | maybe the most critical step is transitioning

00:02:03.220 | from someone who says, "Look, this is not me.

00:02:05.760 | "I don't have discipline.

00:02:07.160 | "I'm not really able to pursue goals

00:02:09.240 | "unless I feel really excited about it in the moment."

00:02:11.520 | How do we shift that self-identity?

00:02:13.540 | And as longtime listeners of the show know,

00:02:16.280 | I really do see discipline as an identity.

00:02:19.500 | It is not something you do, it is an identity.

00:02:23.180 | You see yourself as someone who is disciplined

00:02:26.600 | or you don't, that requires some cultivation.

00:02:29.620 | So at the very bottom of the deep life stack,

00:02:32.200 | and this is why I've highlighted this,

00:02:33.940 | you would get started by putting some elements

00:02:37.440 | into your life that require discipline to accomplish.

00:02:41.400 | And it doesn't really matter

00:02:43.620 | when we're first beginning here what these are.

00:02:48.140 | You just wanna push them to be past what's trivial

00:02:52.400 | but still south of intractable.

00:02:55.600 | So where you're starting from might depend

00:02:57.760 | where how ambitious these initial bits of discipline are.

00:03:02.360 | So this is where you might say,

00:03:03.280 | "Look, I'm gonna train for a 5K.

00:03:06.760 | "I am going to read five books a month."

00:03:09.520 | You're trying to find something

00:03:10.920 | that's gonna require some discipline.

00:03:12.000 | I'm gonna overhaul my nutrition.

00:03:13.360 | I'm gonna do something new.

00:03:14.680 | I'm gonna do this workout routine,

00:03:15.820 | try to hit a streak on Peloton, whatever it is.

00:03:18.600 | You're calibrating it to where you are.

00:03:20.360 | And I don't really care at first the content

00:03:23.120 | of these things you're pursuing with discipline.

00:03:25.560 | This is identity formation.

00:03:27.600 | And that's where we get started.

00:03:28.560 | You take a couple of things in your life.

00:03:30.960 | You say, "How can I make progress on this every day?"

00:03:33.280 | And if it's too hard, you find something easier

00:03:35.120 | until you can move up to something harder

00:03:36.600 | but you're establishing discipline.

00:03:38.280 | The second piece here is you're going to establish

00:03:43.040 | your route for everything we're about to do.

00:03:45.680 | A directory, a folder, a drawer in a desk

00:03:49.120 | where it's gonna be the one place where you keep track

00:03:51.460 | of everything that you've committed to do in your life,

00:03:53.620 | your rules, your systems, your goals.

00:03:55.400 | So that you're going to initialize this route

00:03:57.880 | to your ultimate life planning processes

00:04:00.640 | with these initial discipline projects.

00:04:02.240 | So at the beginning, you could just have a folder

00:04:04.400 | on your desktop, you could have a drawer

00:04:06.000 | where you're just writing down, here's my disciplines.

00:04:08.480 | I'm working on these two things.

00:04:09.720 | Here's what I do every day towards them.

00:04:12.080 | This is going to grow as we move through the deep life stack

00:04:14.640 | but you're establishing here in the discipline step.

00:04:17.080 | Here's where I keep track of what I commit to.

00:04:19.480 | And you're starting to practice having commitments

00:04:21.220 | that are about long-term value,

00:04:22.640 | not what you wanna do in the short term.

00:04:25.640 | So already we're a little bit different

00:04:27.640 | than standard thinking about lifestyle designs

00:04:30.200 | because we're not starting with the decisions.

00:04:32.480 | We're not starting with the let's quit my job.

00:04:36.040 | I wanna move to the country.

00:04:38.020 | We're recognizing that there is some effacement

00:04:41.280 | that has to happen first.

00:04:42.720 | There's some preparation that has to happen first.

00:04:44.700 | We don't wanna jump into the decisions

00:04:47.280 | till we've developed the self first.

00:04:50.480 | So that's the first layer of the stack.

00:04:51.640 | All right, so once that's going,

00:04:53.320 | I have a couple of things and I've impressed myself.

00:04:56.240 | I'm doing these, I didn't think I could.

00:04:58.040 | I am capable of discipline

00:04:59.640 | and I have a centralized place now

00:05:01.360 | to keep track of what I'm doing.

00:05:03.200 | We move on to the next layer.

00:05:05.840 | I'll write this in here.

00:05:07.040 | We'll call this values.

00:05:11.700 | All right, so yet we're not yet the choosing

00:05:14.760 | to quit your job.

00:05:15.600 | We're not yet the moving.

00:05:16.800 | Values is where you are going to establish

00:05:21.120 | what it is that is important to you.

00:05:23.360 | What are the truths that exist

00:05:25.240 | rooted outside of just your own preferences

00:05:27.720 | around which you were going to structure your life?

00:05:31.880 | This is committing to what is important to you.

00:05:34.140 | There's three pieces to figuring out

00:05:35.880 | what your values are gonna be.

00:05:37.400 | I'll write them all three down and then we'll talk about it.

00:05:41.200 | Code, rituals, routines.

00:05:49.360 | So code is actually figuring out,

00:05:50.960 | this is my code that I live by.

00:05:54.240 | I strive to do this.

00:05:55.520 | I will never do this.

00:05:56.960 | I have integrity.

00:05:58.100 | I am honest.

00:05:59.040 | I will prioritize the protection of others, whatever it is.

00:06:03.100 | This is where you make that clear.

00:06:04.720 | I have a code by which I live

00:06:06.720 | and all of my decisions are gonna come back

00:06:09.020 | and make sure that they satisfy this code.

00:06:11.100 | All my big decisions, all my short-term actions

00:06:14.480 | will live by this code.

00:06:16.040 | The code should be something that forces you

00:06:18.360 | on occasion to do things that are hard or scary

00:06:20.600 | in the moment, to move away

00:06:21.640 | what might be in your best interest,

00:06:23.240 | but you have a code written down.

00:06:26.340 | Then you have rituals recorded,

00:06:28.680 | some sort of rituals that you commit to

00:06:32.320 | that help just reinforce in your life

00:06:34.200 | what it is that you value and take seriously.

00:06:38.280 | Finally, you're gonna have routines,

00:06:39.760 | things you do on a regular basis

00:06:42.240 | that ensure that you are supporting these values

00:06:45.440 | that are encoded in your code

00:06:46.760 | that make sure that you are pursuing them,

00:06:49.720 | reflecting the things you value in your everyday life.

00:06:54.320 | Now, of course, the most obvious pre-packaged answer

00:06:57.800 | to these three things would be a traditional religion.

00:07:00.360 | So if you are already religious,

00:07:02.040 | that's gonna make it very easy for you to figure out code

00:07:04.200 | or rituals and routines.

00:07:05.340 | For if you're religious, the ritual is gonna involve,

00:07:07.400 | for example, let's say you're a Muslim,

00:07:10.320 | it might involve daily prayer ritual

00:07:12.800 | as a way of reinforcing and reminding yourself

00:07:15.840 | of your relationship to God.

00:07:18.080 | Routines might involve things

00:07:19.880 | that your religion asks you to do,

00:07:22.040 | such as some sort of charitable giving on a regular basis

00:07:25.960 | to go out and serve others in the community,

00:07:29.080 | but you don't have to have a religion

00:07:31.120 | to fill in code rituals and routines.

00:07:33.000 | You can do so on your own.

00:07:34.840 | The thing I wanna emphasize here

00:07:36.320 | is don't worry so much about getting this exactly right,

00:07:39.020 | because when we're done with this stack,

00:07:41.360 | we're gonna add one final piece, which is iterate.

00:07:44.580 | So you come to the stack where you are

00:07:46.200 | in your life right now,

00:07:47.560 | and you can expect that might change and evolve

00:07:49.960 | as time goes on.

00:07:52.160 | Now, everything you're gonna figure out here for values

00:07:54.960 | gets recorded in that system you set up

00:07:58.280 | during the first level of the stack, during discipline.

00:08:00.740 | That's why I'm drawing an arrow back down there.

00:08:03.420 | That's where you record, here's my code,

00:08:05.040 | the things I value, things I don't,

00:08:07.080 | how I plan to live my life.

00:08:08.580 | That's where you record your rituals.

00:08:11.120 | I meditate every morning.

00:08:12.460 | I read a book of philosophy,

00:08:13.900 | one book per month.

00:08:15.520 | I observe Shabbat as a time to reflect, whatever it is.

00:08:19.560 | It's where the routines go in.

00:08:23.160 | I volunteer every month.

00:08:25.840 | I, whatever it is actually gonna be,

00:08:28.840 | and I go to services, whatever it is,

00:08:31.560 | this is all written down,

00:08:32.760 | and you have a central place for it

00:08:34.240 | because you set that up in discipline.

00:08:37.000 | These two things, these first two layers of the stack,

00:08:39.680 | discipline and values,

00:08:41.100 | this now becomes our safety net foundation.

00:08:44.480 | Before we go up, the things that are gonna follow

00:08:46.320 | are gonna be a little bit more complicated and ambitious,

00:08:48.980 | but if everything else falls apart in your life,

00:08:51.460 | your professional system goes apart,

00:08:53.520 | there's health or sickness issues,

00:08:55.420 | your life takes a turn, there's some sort of disaster,

00:08:59.160 | the two levels that will always be there

00:09:01.080 | for you to fall down on will be discipline plus values.

00:09:04.360 | So this is very important.

00:09:05.640 | The idea that I can do things that are hard

00:09:08.580 | when it's in my long-term interest

00:09:10.120 | or the interest of my values, even if I don't want to,

00:09:11.960 | I'm capable of doing this, and I know what I'm all about,

00:09:14.960 | what is my code, and I'm able to build my life around it,

00:09:18.000 | that is your insurance for disaster.

00:09:20.320 | That is your insurance against everything else going wrong.

00:09:22.600 | If everything else we're about to talk about unravels,

00:09:25.160 | you will be able to fall back on that,

00:09:27.760 | and that's gonna give you a soft landing,

00:09:29.960 | and it's gonna give you a foundation

00:09:31.040 | in which you will eventually be able to rebuild.

00:09:33.440 | All right, so now we're gonna head towards a layer

00:09:36.960 | where we're getting a little bit more

00:09:38.960 | into the traditional design, life design type waters,

00:09:43.740 | and that's gonna be what I call calm.

00:09:45.780 | So the goal with calm is to gain control over your life

00:09:55.320 | and to leverage that control

00:09:59.260 | to give yourself breathing room.

00:10:00.860 | So it's the calm level of the stack

00:10:03.960 | where you are actually going to start thinking

00:10:06.360 | about organizational productivity systems.

00:10:08.880 | How do I keep track of the different obligations

00:10:11.040 | in my professional life and my personal life?

00:10:13.700 | How do I plan?

00:10:14.760 | How do I manage my time?

00:10:16.160 | This is all about I have control.

00:10:18.200 | I'm not just stumbling reactively through life.

00:10:22.640 | I have some control of what's going on.

00:10:24.240 | Now, once you have control, I'm organizing things,

00:10:26.400 | I can build out smart plans,

00:10:28.360 | I can now see much more clearly the relationship

00:10:31.440 | between my implicit workload,

00:10:34.000 | my tacit obligations and my schedule.

00:10:36.800 | Now you have a really good sense of,

00:10:38.400 | is this reasonable or not?

00:10:39.720 | Or how much can I actually have on my plate

00:10:41.960 | before I begin to get stressed out?

00:10:43.200 | And you can leverage this control

00:10:44.400 | to start doing some minimalism,

00:10:47.160 | to start taking some things off of your plate,

00:10:49.240 | to simplify aspects of your commitments

00:10:51.400 | in your personal life, in your family life,

00:10:53.120 | in your professional life.

00:10:54.320 | The goal here is I have control of my time.

00:10:57.480 | I've pruned my schedule to the degree

00:11:00.720 | that I have some flexibility and breathing room.

00:11:03.480 | And I am now ready to start thinking

00:11:06.300 | about some bigger picture changes.

00:11:08.880 | 'Cause if we get to the final stack,

00:11:10.280 | which is where you do the fun stuff,

00:11:12.400 | where you move to the farm,

00:11:13.760 | if you get to that final stack

00:11:15.880 | and your life is chaotic and you're overwhelmed

00:11:18.400 | and you're busy and exhausted and fatigued,

00:11:21.080 | there's not gonna be room for you to do what you need to do.

00:11:23.240 | There's not gonna be room for you to reflect.

00:11:25.600 | There's not gonna be room for you to pursue the disciplines

00:11:28.000 | and values that lay under it.

00:11:29.560 | And there's not gonna be room

00:11:30.520 | to actually make the big changes.

00:11:32.120 | If you don't control your life,

00:11:33.200 | you also are not gonna be able

00:11:34.600 | to build up the career capital

00:11:37.160 | you'll probably need to execute some of these ideas.

00:11:39.760 | The more you're killing it at work,

00:11:43.080 | because you control your time and your obligations

00:11:46.000 | and you can give things the time they need,

00:11:47.800 | the more options you're gonna have to transform that work.

00:11:49.800 | This is true in a lot of different elements as well.

00:11:51.960 | And so this is again,

00:11:52.800 | something you don't always see

00:11:54.760 | when the discussion of lifestyle design,

00:11:56.120 | but I think it's foundational.

00:11:57.520 | I'm throwing it in there.

00:11:59.080 | Calm, I'm under control.

00:12:01.160 | These three things, if you're starting from scratch,

00:12:04.000 | might take a while, by the way.

00:12:05.960 | This might be the work of six months to a year

00:12:08.360 | to build the first three layers.

00:12:09.960 | But once you have, you get to the final stack here,

00:12:12.920 | the final layer of the stack,

00:12:14.360 | which I call plan.

00:12:17.960 | And this finally is where we get back

00:12:22.960 | to more familiar territory.

00:12:24.040 | This is where we get back

00:12:24.880 | towards the deep life buckets territory.

00:12:28.040 | This is where you divide your life

00:12:29.440 | into the major areas that are important to you

00:12:32.200 | and start to think through,

00:12:34.720 | what does my life look like in each of these areas?

00:12:37.200 | What changes do I want to make?

00:12:39.200 | And you don't have to overhaul everything at the same time,

00:12:41.640 | but maybe you look at community,

00:12:44.560 | so your relationship with your family and friends,

00:12:46.640 | those who are important to you and say,

00:12:48.000 | "Okay, let's start overhauling this.

00:12:50.800 | "What do I want this aspect of my life to look like?

00:12:52.720 | "Where does it fall short?

00:12:53.680 | "What type of changes would I need to make

00:12:56.120 | "to better fulfill my values here?"

00:12:58.760 | And this is where you might make the bigger change.

00:13:00.680 | You move to be closer to family.

00:13:02.360 | You commit the community organizations.

00:13:05.040 | Maybe craft, of course, would be a big one here.

00:13:07.000 | Your job, "Okay, let me really think about my job.

00:13:08.920 | "What's going on here?

00:13:09.760 | "Is it overwhelming me?

00:13:10.960 | "Is it compatible with the other things I care about?

00:13:13.880 | "Maybe I want to hatch a plan to transform this job

00:13:17.320 | "into something that's gonna better support

00:13:18.560 | "my vision for my life."

00:13:20.040 | All of this happens here.

00:13:21.080 | The buckets, lifestyle, center, career planning,

00:13:23.000 | all of this is squeezed into the top layer out of four

00:13:26.840 | in the deep life stack.

00:13:28.800 | And this really is the big innovation

00:13:31.240 | between the way we used to talk about it

00:13:33.160 | and the way we're talking about it now.

00:13:36.800 | If discipline, values, and calm is foundational,

00:13:41.360 | and if we ignore that, whatever we do up in plan

00:13:44.400 | is gonna be haphazard and be very likely to fizzle.

00:13:49.040 | We try to make some big change,

00:13:50.520 | but if we don't have anything else nailed down,

00:13:52.680 | we're building this big change,

00:13:54.080 | this new conceptual structure for our life on top of sand.

00:13:56.400 | That foundation is not strong enough.

00:13:59.160 | I'm gonna add a couple more arrows here

00:14:00.480 | because again, throughout each of these stacks,

00:14:04.240 | where do your decisions go?

00:14:05.680 | Back into that central repository you set up

00:14:09.080 | during the discipline level.

00:14:11.240 | These are my organizational systems for calm.

00:14:14.280 | This is what I'm working on right now.

00:14:16.240 | I'm working on my craft bucket, and here's my vision.

00:14:19.280 | So in that discipline step, that all got set up.

00:14:21.960 | Now the number of disciplines,

00:14:23.360 | the things that you are pursuing regularly

00:14:25.400 | that you're committed to,

00:14:26.240 | that also increases as you move up the stack.

00:14:28.800 | Values adds rituals and routines

00:14:30.760 | to your list of disciplines.

00:14:31.840 | Calm adds organizational systems

00:14:33.440 | to your list of disciplines.

00:14:34.680 | Plan might add bucket specific keystone habits

00:14:37.760 | to your list of disciplines.

00:14:39.160 | So everything down there grows.

00:14:40.760 | The description of your systems,

00:14:41.880 | the descriptions of your discipline commitments,

00:14:43.400 | that all grows as you move up the stack.

00:14:47.480 | So I have these arrows pointing back down.

00:14:50.360 | And then finally, once you've made it

00:14:52.800 | through the whole stack,

00:14:54.480 | I'm gonna draw one last arrow here,

00:14:57.000 | you are going to iterate.

00:14:59.120 | Which means you return back towards the bottom

00:15:02.440 | and refactor, focusing on what needs the most work.

00:15:07.800 | So you've made it through the whole stack,

00:15:11.200 | enjoy that for a while.

00:15:12.680 | Then you're gonna iterate back down again.

00:15:13.920 | Okay, let's go back down the discipline.

00:15:15.200 | How is this going?

00:15:16.240 | If I cleaned up my description on my systems

00:15:19.120 | and my disciplines,

00:15:19.960 | are there stuff hanging around here I don't do anymore?

00:15:21.360 | Let me clean that up,

00:15:22.200 | make sure the way I'm tracking this goes well.

00:15:24.360 | Am I committing discipline to the things I said I am?

00:15:27.520 | If I'm not, do I have too many things in here?

00:15:29.000 | Do I need to clean that up?

00:15:29.880 | Okay, we're good, let's move up the values.

00:15:31.760 | Am I liking my current code?

00:15:33.520 | The rituals I have in place to help reinforce the code,

00:15:35.680 | the routines I have to put that code

00:15:37.160 | into action in the world.

00:15:38.760 | Am I ready to tweak that?

00:15:39.920 | Do I wanna make a major change?

00:15:41.840 | Am I maybe at first earlier in my life,

00:15:43.960 | these were self-imposed and in middle age with a family,

00:15:46.480 | they're gonna be more tied to a formal theology.

00:15:49.480 | So you're going back and checking that out.

00:15:50.920 | You're going up to calm.

00:15:52.520 | How are my systems going for organization?

00:15:54.160 | Oh, maybe they're going well.

00:15:55.280 | What about my load?

00:15:56.120 | You know, I feel overloaded.

00:15:57.440 | Great, so as I revisit that stack,

00:15:59.120 | I'm gonna make some more cuts

00:16:01.280 | on the things that I'm committed to or pursuing.

00:16:03.200 | And you can back up the plan.

00:16:04.240 | You might say, I'm gonna look

00:16:05.080 | at another bucket more carefully.

00:16:06.720 | I looked at craft last time,

00:16:08.000 | but I really wanna now think about celebration,

00:16:11.040 | sort of quality in my life.

00:16:12.560 | That's iteration.

00:16:13.520 | You go back through the whole stack,

00:16:15.120 | checking at each layer,

00:16:16.600 | spending time on the layers that need time

00:16:18.640 | before moving on to the next.

00:16:20.760 | You probably wanna do this once a year.

00:16:22.280 | I recommend using your birthday as the anchor for this.

00:16:25.840 | Different years, you're gonna stop

00:16:27.400 | and spend more time on different layers than others.

00:16:30.000 | Sometimes everything might be rock and rolling,

00:16:31.800 | so you're just tweaking on your way up

00:16:33.120 | and it takes you a couple of weeks, no problem.

00:16:35.520 | Sometimes you're gonna lose the next six months

00:16:37.240 | of your years of really reflectively rethinking your life,

00:16:39.600 | but this structures the way you think about that.

00:16:42.000 | It structures the way you go through trying to refactor

00:16:44.520 | or tighten up what's actually going on

00:16:47.360 | in your day-to-day existence.

00:16:48.840 | So this is what I'm thinking about now.

00:16:52.040 | This is my generalization

00:16:53.480 | of what used to just be the deep life buckets,

00:16:55.160 | the deep life stack.

00:16:58.080 | It's equal parts psychology as it is practical habit,

00:17:03.080 | as it is visionary planning.

00:17:05.760 | All of those things are now mixed together

00:17:08.160 | in a more structured way.

00:17:10.360 | This also reflects more carefully or closely,

00:17:13.000 | I should say, what I actually do in my own life,

00:17:15.520 | the way I think these things through,

00:17:16.760 | the way I order these things.

00:17:18.200 | So I'm interested in your thoughts.

00:17:21.440 | Are we improving or have we overcomplicated?

00:17:24.640 | I still have time to think about this,

00:17:26.440 | so feel free to send it through.

00:17:27.960 | I don't know, Jesse, am I adding too much complication

00:17:30.160 | or are we getting to some levels we actually needed

00:17:34.440 | for thinking about this topic?

00:17:35.960 | - I think it goes in hand with what you've talked about

00:17:40.160 | before in terms of stacks and discipline

00:17:43.960 | and metric tracking.

00:17:45.120 | So like the metric tracking on the time block planner

00:17:47.000 | would be in that level.

00:17:48.320 | - Yeah, it becomes a discipline.

00:17:50.400 | Right, the time block planner

00:17:52.520 | is something you might introduce as calm.

00:17:55.160 | The metric planning is installed in the discipline stack.

00:17:59.240 | - Yeah. - Yeah.

00:18:00.600 | Yeah, I think one of the things I was underestimating,

00:18:04.400 | so in addition to just the psychological preparation,

00:18:08.320 | was I take for granted structure and organization

00:18:10.920 | in my life.

00:18:12.040 | And it's something we hear from listeners a lot,

00:18:14.360 | is if you are not organized and structured

00:18:18.240 | in how you manage just even the minutia of your life,

00:18:20.920 | it's actually really difficult to do anything big.

00:18:23.040 | - Yeah.

00:18:23.880 | - It feels impossible or if you try it,

00:18:26.320 | it's not gonna go well because you're just throwing

00:18:28.480 | a big change in an already chaotic situation.

00:18:31.440 | - Yeah, you've had that in place for a really long time.

00:18:34.040 | - Yeah, and that's why I take it for granted.

00:18:35.760 | - Yeah.

00:18:36.600 | - But I think for a lot of people,

00:18:37.480 | I was thinking, if I'm gonna write a book

00:18:38.440 | about the deep life, I can't jump into,

00:18:41.680 | let's overhaul your job,

00:18:44.200 | when there's someone who has never actually had

00:18:45.920 | any sort of coherent organizational system

00:18:48.600 | to any part of their life.

00:18:49.880 | It's impossible, until you feel that you control

00:18:52.040 | your life in that breathing room,

00:18:53.040 | it's very difficult to imagine making a big change.

00:18:56.280 | And we're gonna see that,

00:18:58.200 | the questions I chose for today's episode

00:18:59.800 | are all deep life related.

00:19:01.240 | So issues and questions about people pursuing the deep life.

00:19:04.640 | And we're gonna see some of that in the questions.

00:19:07.120 | There's at least one I have in mind where someone is,

00:19:10.360 | they're coming to what you would think about

00:19:12.040 | as the plan level of the stack,

00:19:14.320 | with the other levels not in place,

00:19:16.280 | and it just feels impossible to them.

00:19:17.720 | - Yeah, I mean, a lot of that has come down

00:19:19.480 | to your time management system.

00:19:21.320 | - Yeah. - Yeah.

00:19:22.240 | - Yeah, how do you keep track of your time?

00:19:24.040 | Then how do you manage your obligations?

00:19:26.320 | And how do you then prune those obligations, right?

00:19:29.680 | It's very difficult to keep breathing room in your life,

00:19:33.000 | if you can't control the stuff that's taking away the air.

00:19:36.040 | If you don't control it, you're just grabbing.

00:19:38.880 | It's very hard to get at things or organize things

00:19:41.720 | or move things out of the way.

00:19:42.960 | It's very paradoxical, 'cause people say,

00:19:45.520 | "I don't wanna be so, I don't have time

00:19:47.960 | to do all these systems and be so rigid,

00:19:50.400 | and then my whole life will be planning."

00:19:52.040 | But it's exactly the people that make a structure

00:19:56.560 | for the stuff in their life that have the flexibility.

00:19:59.400 | - Yeah. - That have the breathing room,

00:20:00.920 | that have their feet up by the lake and are reading.

00:20:03.560 | It's this misnomer that somehow having organization

00:20:06.480 | will mean your time is more filled.

00:20:08.240 | It's actually the key to actually gain back time,

00:20:12.040 | to find time affluence, to take some flexibility.

00:20:14.680 | - It's your boy, Jaco, discipline equals freedom.

00:20:17.160 | - Yeah, well, that term is, yeah, definitely motivating

00:20:20.840 | or an inspiration here, discipline at the base.

00:20:23.600 | - Provides the freedom to do other things.

00:20:25.360 | - It does. - Read five books a month.

00:20:26.920 | - And that was the other breakthrough I'm thinking,

00:20:28.520 | because I've found this working with people,

00:20:30.600 | just finding that one or two things,

00:20:32.040 | that's the place to start.

00:20:33.680 | I'm doing this thing, I'm working on it every day,

00:20:35.440 | it's hard, it's optional, I don't wanna do it in the moment.

00:20:38.720 | Long-term, I did it, I succeeded.

00:20:41.520 | That psychological switch,

00:20:43.880 | that's so important to everything else.

00:20:45.800 | So we'll see, so I'm working on it,

00:20:48.280 | but it's one idea for how I might structure

00:20:50.240 | my deep life book.

Reinvent Yourself: How To Completely Change Your Life Before 2024 | Cal Newport

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