All right, our next question here comes from Freddie. Freddie says, is the following understanding of deep work durations correct? All right, then he goes on to elaborate. When deep work is geared towards deliberate practice, something like learning how to program, only four hours can be sustained per day since deliberate practice is inherently not fun when you're stretching your abilities.

However, when deep work is geared towards work that can generate a flow state, something like writing computer programs, it can be extended to eight hours or maybe even 10. So Freddie, that's more or less correct. So that four hour limit that I mentioned in my book, Deep Work, really came from a study of deliberate practice.

It was actually an Anders Ericsson paper studying violin players. I've also seen anecdotally this four hour limit confirmed by other, in particular, professional musicians. So practicing a musical instrument at the professional level is a very intense act of deliberate practice. You're not just playing things, you know you're stretching your ability, you're trying to perfect.

And the standard schedule that Anders found, and I've heard other people talk about as well, is two hours break two hours, adds up to four hours. So that's correct. Other type of deep work, yes, you can do much longer. So remember for something to be counted as deep work, it needs two attributes.

It has to be cognitively demanding, so it can't be trivial. And it has to be done without distraction, so no context shifting. You're giving your full attention to the effort, you're not also checking email, you're not also checking your phone. That covers a lot of activities, include a lot of activities though, that though not super simple, because it has to be cognitively demanding, are things you could do all day long.

Right, a lot of deep work is not nearly as intense as a professional musician trying to push their skill to the next level. So yes, most deep work you could do much longer than four hours. Even deliberate practice, most people are gonna do longer than four hours 'cause they don't do it nearly as intensely as professional musicians.

I think most people are just not familiar about how cognitively intense real practice actually is. In my book, "So Good They Can't Ignore You," I try to capture this with an anecdote where I went and spent time with a professional guitar player. And I wrote about what it looks like to watch a professional guitar player practice.

In this case, the player, Jordan, Jordan Tice is his name. Actually, he played at my wedding. Jordan was practicing with such intensity that he would forget to breathe. And then he would have a ragged gasp as he sucked in air, his body forcing to suck in air. That's what it looks like when you're deliberate practicing at your full extent.

That you can't do more than four hours, but most people aren't anywhere near that level of intensity. So typically what I tell people is, don't fret too much about these limits for deep work, numbers or thresholds, you're fine. Just make sure you're doing deep work on a regular basis.

Don't be distracted, focus on the hard things, do that regularly and good things will come. (upbeat music) (upbeat music)