Quotes About Commitment

We could, of course, eliminate this anachronistic commitment to busyness if we could easily demonstrate its negative impact on the bottom line, but the metric black hole enters the scene at this point and prevents such clarity.

this thirty-day experiment

Indeed, if you study the lives of other influential figures from both distant and recent history, you'll find that a commitment to deep work is a common theme.

To successfully adopt the craftsman mindset, therefore, we have to approach our jobs in the same way that Jordan approaches his guitar playing or Garry Kasparov his chess training—with a dedication to deliberate practice.

Stephenson sees two mutually exclusive options: He can write good novels at a regular rate, or he can answer a lot of individual e-mails and attend conferences, and as a result produce lower-quality novels at a slower rate.

big trends in business today actively decrease people's ability to perform deep work, even though the benefits promised by these trends (e.g., increased serendipity, faster responses to requests, and more exposure) are arguably dwarfed by the benefits that flow from a commitment to deep work (e.g., the ability to learn hard things fast and produce at an elite level).

it's not just the change of environment or seeking of quiet that enables more depth. The dominant force is the psychology of committing so seriously to the task at hand. To put yourself in an exotic location to focus on a writing project, or to take a week off from work just to think, or to lock yourself in a hotel room until you complete an important invention: These gestures push your deep goal to a level of mental priority that helps unlock the needed mental resources.

I love what I do for a living. I'm also confident that as I continue my commitment to the ideas discovered in my quest, this love will only deepen. Thomas feels the same way about his work. So do most of the people I profiled in the book. I

It's crucial, therefore, that you figure out in advance what you're going to do with your evenings and weekends before they begin.

Don't follow your passion; rather, let it follow in your quest to become, in the words of my favorite Steve Martin quote, "so good that they can't ignore you.

I'll live the focused life, because it's the best kind there is.

The dominant force is the psychology of committing so seriously to the task at hand.

just because you really want to organize your work around a mission doesn't mean that you can easily make it happen.

In Wrzesniewski's research, the happiest, most passionate employees are not those who followed their passion into a position, but instead those who have been around long enough to become good at what they do.

to your work, then he will close the deal. To

Jordan left me in the dust. I played. But he practiced.

the happiest, most passionate employees are not those who followed their passion into a position, but instead those who have been around long enough to become good at what they do.

if you're not putting in the effort to become, as Steve Martin put it, "so good they can't ignore you," you're not likely to end up loving your work—regardless of whether or not you believe it's your true calling.

Discipline #4: Create a Cadence of Accountability

Según declaran los autores de The 4 Disciplines of Execution, «cuanto más queremos abarcar, menos logramos hacer».

be sure to also give yourself a specific time frame to keep the session a discrete challenge and not an open-ended slog.

It was the glacial writing progress during this year that drove Chappell to embrace the rhythmic method. He made a rule that he would wake up and start working by five thirty every morning. He would then work until seven thirty, make breakfast, and go to work already done with his dissertation obligations for the day. Pleased by early progress, he soon pushed his wake-up time to four forty-five to squeeze out even more morning depth.

To work deeply is a big deal and should not be an activity undertaken lightly. Surrounding such efforts with a complicated (and perhaps, to the outside world, quite strange) ritual accepts this reality—providing your mind with the structure and commitment it needs to slip into the state of focus where you can begin to create things that matter.

I earlier quoted Winifred Gallagher, the converted disciple of depth, saying, "I'll live the focused life, because it's the best kind there is.