Tim Ferriss

February 21, 2024

Cal Newport — How to Embrace Slow Productivity, Build a Deep Life, Achieve Mastery, and Defend Your Time (#722)

“You can’t be busy and frenetic and bouncing off the walls with 100 projects if you’re obsessed about doing something really well.”
— Cal Newport

Cal Newport is a professor of computer science at Georgetown University, where he is also a founding member of the Center for Digital Ethics. In addition to his academic work, Newport is a New York Times bestselling author who writes for a general audience about the intersection of technology, productivity, and culture. His books have sold millions of copies and been translated into over forty languages. He is also a contributor to The New Yorker and hosts the popular Deep Questions podcast.

His new book is Slow Productivity: The Lost Art of Accomplishment Without Burnout.

Please enjoy!

Listen to the episode on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Overcast, Podcast Addict, Pocket Casts, Castbox, Google Podcasts, Amazon Music, or on your favorite podcast platform. Watch the interview on YouTube here.

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The transcript of this episode can be found here. Transcripts of all episodes can be found here.

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#722: Cal Newport — How to Embrace Slow Productivity, Build a Deep Life, Achieve Mastery, and Defend Your Time

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What was your favorite quote or lesson from this episode? Please let me know in the comments.

Want to hear the last time Cal Newport was on this show? Listen here to our conversation in which we discussed lessons from Steve Martin, living the deep life, how Cal secured his first book deal as an unproven 20-year-old, honing the funny bone for humor writing, mastering slow productivity despite 21st-century distractions, crafting the lives we desire, considering the spiritual as an exercise of meticulous craft and creation, Cal’s 30-day digital minimalism declutter, and much more.

#568: Cal Newport — The Eternal Pursuit of Craftsmanship, the Deep Life, Slow Productivity, and a 30-Day Digital Minimalism Challenge

SELECTED LINKS FROM THE EPISODE

Connect with Cal Newport:

Website | Blog | YouTube

SHOW NOTES

[06:14] Unforced Errors: The Internet Story.
[09:41] Techno-selectionism.
[18:06] Why YouTube and podcasts aren’t ideal bedfellows.
[23:03] Amish technology and Steve Martin.
[28:07] What prompted Cal to write Slow Productivity?
[31:35] Becoming a better writer through blogging.
[36:54] The benefits of obsessing over quality.
[40:54] How did Cal decide to identify himself as a writer?
[52:02] People who exemplify slow productivity.
[58:45] Trade-offs on the path to 21st-century slow productivity.
[1:03:16] Push systems vs. pull systems.
[1:04:34] Quota systems.
[1:06:08] Why slow productivity isn’t a zero-sum game.
[1:09:33] Language that clarifies.
[1:13:17] Sender filters.
[1:16:20] What people might miss about Slow Productivity‘s message.
[1:21:24] How Cal defines productivity.
[1:25:36] Derek Sivers and money as a neutral indicator of value.
[1:28:34] Contemporary slow productivity champions.
[1:33:18] Asynchronous vs. real-time conversations.
[1:35:51] Making group scheduling less hellish.
[1:40:13] Cal’s problem with Frederick Winslow Taylor.
[1:42:01] How The New Yorker maintains its old-timey charm where other publications fail.
[1:49:05] Cal’s dream publications.
[1:51:07] Mental models for cultivating a slow productivity mindset.
[1:56:27] The consequences of playing the algorithm game.
[2:03:14] The renewed viability of newsletters.
[2:08:03] Parting thoughts.

MORE CAL NEWPORT QUOTES FROM THE INTERVIEW

“You can’t be busy and frenetic and bouncing off the walls with 100 projects if you’re obsessed about doing something really well.”
— Cal Newport

“As you get better at something, the more say you get over the way your life unfolds.”
— Cal Newport

“You’ve got to just not want to get started until you can’t help but get started. And I think that’s frustrating for a lot of the internet generation because it takes a really long time.”
— Cal Newport

“There was no hustle culture. That’s the interesting thing. When you go back and study people producing things of real value, using their brain, they were smart and they were dedicated and they worked really hard, but they didn’t hustle and they didn’t work 10-hour days day after day. They didn’t work all-out, year-round. They didn’t push, push, push until this thing was done. It was a more natural variation. They had less on their plate at the same time, and they glued it all together by obsessing over quality.”
— Cal Newport

“There’s nothing more quixotic than the overburdened worker who is trying to not say no, but get the person who’s giving them the work to voluntarily agree to not give them the work. It never works. If someone’s trying to get you to do something, and you’re like, ‘Well, I guess I could, but I am pretty busy,’ they’re never going to say, ‘You sound busy. Don’t do this.’ They’re like, ‘Yeah? Good. Well, I’m glad you can do it. Here you go. Get this off my plate.’”
— Cal Newport

“Slow productivity produces good stuff. It doesn’t just make the workers happier. It doesn’t just make you happier. You produce better stuff. I mean, your company has more profit. Your clients are happier. You can charge more for the services you offer, so it’s not zero sum. It’s more win-win than anything else.”
— Cal Newport

“Busyness doesn’t produce high value.”
— Cal Newport

“Don’t try to convince people of new things. Explain to them what they already know in a way that lets them take better action.”
— Cal Newport

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Catarina Macaroco

1 year ago

Hi Tim, I’ve been listening to your podcast since 2018 so I’m obviously a fan. What I’ve noticed though is that you rarely interview women and I’ve been meaning to point this out to you for a while but somehow never did. Until reading this post by Elise Loehnen https://eliseloehnen.substack.com/p/ending-the-manel shared in Money with Katie’s newsletter.
As much as I love hearing incredibly intelligent men talking about all subjects I’d love to hear the thoughts of the many incredibly intelligent women out there also. I urge you to give it some more thought as I’m sure you’re aware of this. It just gets tiring after so many years, and makes me feel like you don’t care and/or think less of women’s expertise. And maybe you don’t and it just happened, maybe women’s episodes have less streams than men’s (which would be caused by both male and female listeners). I don’t know. What I know is that I’ve noticed and it tickles me the wrong way.

Xuan Redding

1 year ago

What was the name of the school in Austin TX for guys that’s similar to Alpha Coach?

Valerie Beck

1 year ago

Actually I had a comment about the poem you were pondering in your 5-Bullet Friday. Couldn’t find another place to put it:
“if you don’t become the ocean
you’ll be seasick
every day”
The way I interpret this last verse: If you don’t accept the totality of all of human experience – the good, the bad, the ups and the downs, you’ll always be at the mercy of every little disturbance, you’ll always be caught up in the drama of everyday existence, never to be empowered to rise above it into your full potential.

asachaman

1 year ago

Reply to Valerie Beck

very very god ; )

Adam

1 year ago

Reply to Valerie Beck

Great analysis, and so true

LINDSAY GRENIER

1 year ago

RE: the Lenard Cohen poem/quote – made me laugh outloud as ‘the ocean’ was the culminating metaphor/experience and ultimately inside joke of an utterly magical delightful meditation retreat at the Whidbey institute. Of course it makes one sea sick not to recognize oneness. Truly great retreat – the heart of who we are, Caverly Morgan (who was a zen monk for 8 years and as a result, though she carries much respect and reverence for what she learned there, does pretty much the opposite of everything that seems to increase the risk of meditation) – I think you’d find her fascinating and amazing. Give a listen to the people I mostly admire podcast with her. (ok, I’m also a friend so biased – but truly, she’s wonderful and wise AND the whidbey institute is magical…and they feed you REALLY well. It’s a yearly retreat now. July

M. C. Domandi

1 year ago

I was surprised that in the conversation about Podcasts going toward video that there was no mention of what people listen to in their automobiles. Audio podcasts seem like they will still occupy that space indefinitely (or at least until self driving cars become viable and the three-dimensional world ceases to be part of our consciousness).

Lem Bach

1 year ago

Dr. Newport talks about buildilng a “rare and valuable” skill. Is content writing and/or book writing still going to be rare when ChatGPT can produce grammatically perfect writing so fast? What would Cal recommend an aspiring writer focus on for the next 5–10 years? I was really hoping in this interview to hear him comment on how AI may be changing the future of writing.

Paul Parker

1 year ago

Tim,
I have one praise and one thought (unsolicited piece of advice) for you, both from the 40ish minute mark of this episode.
Praise:
There are a lot of great podcasters out there indebted to you and your ability to “ask questions and then get out of the way,” as Cal put it. Regardless of how mimmickable podcasting becomes, you are an original and one of the best. It’s easy to see the influence of your style in this overly saturated podcast culture. As you guys discussed the TikTok and YouTube attention span, I thought about what might be the most important aspect of 1,000 true fans—keeping them.
Just as I can’t talk of the previous era’s interviewers without mentioning Larry King, Barbara Walters, and Oprah, The Time Ferriss Show will always be at the top of the list of essential podcasts because of its incredible interviewer.

Unsolicited Advice:
I’m sure you’ve heard the phrase “killing your darlings.” If you want your next book to be smaller, don’t just say less. Leave stuff unsaid. When discussing edits, a friend of mine always references the parable of the sower and says, “those who have ears, let them hear,” could be translated to, “if you get it, you get. If you don’t, you don’t.” (Ironically, her verson is longer.)
To compare your interviews with your books, maybe you should write the whole draft like you do a whole interview, but then get a machete and cut out everything in your draft that wouldn’t make it into a monthly recap episode. Since you’re used to writing encyclopedia or phone directory length books, give us only encyclopedia A or just the section of people with the last name Smith.
Whether your next project is short like Plato’s Apology or long like Republic, we know there’s value and we’re going to read it.

Last edited 1 year ago by Paul Parker