July 24, 2021

Make Time by jake Knapp and John Zeratsky

summary of Make Time (5minute read)

Reclaiming your time and attention can be weirdly easy. As Jake learned from his distraction-free iPhone, the changes do not require tons of self-discipline. Instead, changes come from resetting defaults, creating barriers, and beginning to design the way you spend your time. Once you start using Make Time, these small positive shifts become self-reinforcing. The more you try it, the more you'll learn about yourself and the more the system will improve.

Make Time is just four steps repeated every day

The four daily steps of make time are inspired by what we learned from design sprints, from our own experiments, and from readers from have tried out the framework and shared their results. Here's a zoomed-out view of how each day looks:

The first step is choosing a single highlight to prioritize in your day. Next, you'll employ specific tactics to stay laser-focused on that highlight-we'll learn to offer a menu of tricks to beat distraction in an always-connected world. Throughout the day, you'll build the energy so you can stay in control of your time and attention. Finally, you'll reflect on the day with a few simple notes.

Highlight: Start each day by choosing a focal point

The first step in making time is deciding what you want to make time for. Every day, you'll choose a single activity to prioritize and protect in your calendar. It might be a goal at work, like finishing a presentation.

Of course, your highlight isn't the only thing you'll do each day. But it will be your priority.

Laser: Beat distraction on Make Time for Highlight

We'll show you how to adjust your technology so you can find laser mode. Simple changes like logging out of social media apps or scheduling time to check email can have a huge effect.

Energize: Use the body to recharge the brain

Charge your battery with exercise, food, sleep, quiet, and face-to-face time. It's not hard as it might sound. The lifestyle default of the twenty-first century ignores our evolutionary history and robs of energy. That's actually good news: because things are so out of heck, there are a lot of easy fixes.

Reflect: Adjust and improve your system

Finally, before going to bed, you'll take a few notes. It's super simple: you'll decide which tactics you want to continue and which ones you want to refine or drop.

Over time you will build a customized daily system tailored to your uniques habits and routines, your unique brain and body, and your unique goals and priorities.

Highlight

We do not remember days, we remember the moment.

What will be the highlight of your day?

Three ways to pick your highlight

Urgency:

The first strategy is known as urgency: What is the most pressing thing I need to do today?

Satisfaction:

The second highlight strategy is to think about satisfaction: At the end of the day, which will bring me the most satisfaction?

Joy:

The third strategy is focused on joy: When I reflect on today, what will bring me the most joy?

A good rule of thumb is to choose a highlight that takes sixty to ninety minutes. If you spend less than sixty minutes, you might not have time to get in the zone, but after ninety minutes of focused attention, most people need a break. Sixty to ninety minutes is a sweet spot.

Highlight Tactics

Choose your highlight

Write it down: Make writing down your highlight simply a daily ritual. You can do It any time, but the evening (before bed) and the morning time work best for most people.
Groundhog It (or, "Do Yesterday Again"): Not sure what to choose for your highlight? Just like Bill Murray in the movie Groundhog Day, You can do it yesterday again. You don't have to reinvent yourself every day. Once you've identified something that's important to you, focusing on it day after day will help it to take root in your life, grow, and flourishing. sounds cheesy, but that's true.

Batch little stuff: It can be tough to focus on your highlight when you know there are dozens of non-highlight tasks piling up. We have the same problem.

   ***Bundle up the small task and use batch processing to get them all done in one highlight session. In other words, make a batch of small things into your big things.***

Make time for your highlight

Schedule your highlight: If you want to make time for your highlight, start with the calendar. Like writing down your highlight, this tactic can hardly be simpler. When you schedule something you are making a commitment to yourself sending yourself a tiny message that says: "I am going to do this."
Block your calendar: If you start with an em[ty calendar, you can schedule your highlight for the ideal time: when your energy is the highest and your focus is at its peak.
Fake it until you make it: There will be days and weeks when you feel so busy and overschedule that you can't imagine how you'll ever make time for your highlight. When this happens, ask yourself what you can cancel, Can you skip the meeting, push back a deadline, or ditch your plans with friends?
Design your day: Blocking your calendar and scheduling your highlight is a great way to start making time. But you can take this proactive, intentional mindset to another level by designing your entire day.
Become a morning person: Wake up early in the morning and get your highlight done. Studies have shown that people who waked up in the early morning are more likely to be focused and productive than the night owls.
Quit when you are done: If you didn't finish your highlight, You (hopefully) had to bump it for some unforeseen super important project. If that's the case, you can still feel satisfied knowing you did something urgent and necessary. Good job! Now let yourself ignore that inbox and call it a day.

Laser

To pay attention, this is our endless and proper work.

Tech companies make money when you use their products. They won't offer you small doses voluntarily; they'll offer you fire hoses. And if these infinity pools are harder to resist today they will be harder to resist tomorrow.

But by default, we don't just get the best of modern technology. We get all of it, all the time. We get futuristic superpowers and addictive distractions, together, on every screen. The better technology gets, the cooler our superpowers will become-and the more of our time and attention the machine will steal.

It is like compound interest. The longer you remain focused on your highlight the more you engaging you'll find it better work(or play) you'll do.

"part of the reason we're all so hooked on distractions is that everybody else is, too. It's the fear of missing out-FOMO-and we've all got it. How will make small talk if we haven't seen the latest HBO series, or read the latest Trump tweets, or studied the cool feature of the brand new iPhone? Everybody else is doing it, and we don't want to get left behind."

Laser Tactic

Be the boss of your phone

Try Distraction free phone:

Delete social apps.
Delete other infinity pools.
Delete the email and remove your account.
Remove web browser.
Keep everything else.

Log out: Typing username and password is a hassle, so websites and apps makes sure you don't have to do it very often. They encourage you to stay logged in' leaving the door distraction wide open.
Clear your home screen: Try to make your home screen blank. Move all the icons to the next screen over (and from the second screen to the third and so on). Don't leave anything behind on that first screen except a nice clean view of your beautiful background image.
Wear a wristwatch: A wristwatch replaces the need to check your phone whenever you want to know the time. nd if you're anything like us, a quick time check on your phone often pulls you into an Infinity pool, especially when there is a notification on the screen. If you use your phone then you can keep your phone out of the sight. When it is out of sight it is easy to ignore.

Stay out of Infinity Pools

Skip the morning check-in: It is tempting to check in first thing in the morning and get the latest updates; after all, something in the world always changes overnight. But soon as you fire up the screen, you start a tug-of-war of attention between the present and everything out there on the internet.
Ignore the news: We've got some breaking news of our own: You don't need to follow the daily news, True breaking news will find you, and the rest isn't urgent or just doesn't matter.
Fly without WI-FI: You have to change a couple of defaults to make time. First, if your seat has a screen turn it off when you sit down. Second, if your airplane has Wi-Fi, don't pay for it. Make these two choices at the beginning of your flight, fasten your safety belt, and enjoy Laser mode above 35,000 feet.
Put the timer on the internet: Today's always-on Internet is a wonderful thing, but it's also the world's biggest infinity pool. It can be hard to stay on the laser mode when you know the endless possibilities of the internet are just milliseconds away.
Cancel the internet: Canceling your Internet is not quite as extreme as it sounds, because you can still get online by using your phone as a hotspot. But that's slow-ish and expensive-ish and a big hassle.

Make time "Sometimes Treat"

The most corrosive piece of technology thatgI've ever seen is called telivision-but than, again, telivision, at its best, is magnificient.

Don't watch the news: Summarize the most important events of the day, most TV news offers us anxiety-provoking stories handpicked to keep you agitated and turned in. Instead, make habit of reading the news once per day or even per week.
Put your TV in the corner: Rearrange the furniture so that looking at the television is a bit awkward and inconvenient. This way, the default activity becomes conversations.
Ditch your TV for a projector: consider buying a projector and a fold-up projection screen instead. It's a cheaper way to get a cinemalike display. It's also a pain in the ass to set up every time you want to watch.

Find Flow

Shut the door: Close doors signal to everyone else that you shouldn't be interrupted, and they send signals to you, too. You're telling yourself. "Everything I need to pay attention o is right here."
Invent a deadline: Inven deadlines are the secret ingredient in our design sprints. The team schedule customer interviews on Friday of every sprint wee so that starting on Monday, everyone knows the clock is ticking, They have to solve their challenge and build up a prototype before Thursday night; after all those strangers are showing up on Friday! The deadline is totally made up, but it helps teams stay in Laser mode for five straight days.
Set a visible timer: If you use the Time Timer when you're getting into laser mode you'll feel an instant, visceral sense of urgency in a totally good way. By showing time elapsing, the Time Timer will get you to focus.
Start on a paper: Paper improves focus because you can't waste time by picking the perfect font searching on the web instead of working on your highlight.

Stay in the zone

Make a "Random Question List: It's natural to feel twitchy for your phone or browser. You'll wonder if you have any new emails. Instead of reacting to every twitch, write your question on a piece of paper( How much do wool socks cost in Amazon? Any Facebook updates?).
Be bored: When you Deprived of distraction, you may feel bored- but boredom is actually a good thing. Boredom gives your mind a chance to wander, and wandering often leads you to interesting places. In separate studies, researchers as Penn State and the University of Central Lancashire found that bored test subjects were better at creative problem solving than were their non-bored peers. So next time you feeling understimulated for a few minutes, just sit there. You're bored? Lucky you!
Take a day off: If you've tried these Techniques and you still don't have Laser mode in you, don't beat yourself up. You might need a rest day.

Energize

If you want energy from your brain, you need to take care of yor body.

Act like a caveman to build energy

HI! You've been zapped back in time 50,000 years. Your stomach grumbles and your head feels fuzzy. Somewhere in the distance, a roar echoes off the hills. Today, you decided, is going to suck.

But it doesn't suck.

first, you meet a local-gatherer named UrK. UrK looks like your stereotypical cavemen. He wears a tunic made from a mountain lion pelt and has a beard that would put a hipster to shame.

The principle for energizing:

Keet it moving:

Exercise every day: Exercise every day for twenty minutes every day.
Pound the pavement: We were born to walk. Walking is really, really darned good for you. Walking is more practically a wonder drug. Walking may be the world's simplest and most convenient form of exercise, but despite being easy, it packs a powerful charge for our battery.
Inconvenience Yourself: Cook dinners, take the stairs, Use suitcases without wheels.

Eat real food:

Eat like Hunter-Gatherer: Eating real food-in other words, nonprocessed ingredients UrK would recognize, such as plants, nuts, fish, and meat- made a huge difference in our energy levels. After all humans evolved to eat real food, so it's not surprising that your engine performs better when you give the expected fuel.
Central Park your plate: One simple technique to keep the meal light and energizing is to put salad on your plate first, then add everything else around it. It's just like Central Park in New Wor city.

Optimize caffeine:

Wake Up Before you Caffeinate: Wake up without caffeine (in other words, get out of bed, eat breakfast, and start the day without any coffee). Have the first cup between 9:30 and 10:30 a.m. . Have the last cup between 1:30 and 2:30 p.m.
Caffeine before you Crash: The tricky thing about caffeine is that if you wait to drink it until you get tired, it's too late. Instead, think about when your energy regularly dips- for most of us, it's after lunch-and have coffee (or caffeinated beverage as your choice) thirty minutes beforehand.
Take Caffeine Nap: On a slightly complicated but high-yield way to take advantage of caffeine, mechanics is to wait till you get tired drink some caffeine, then immediately take a fifteen-minute nap. Caffeine takes a while to be absorbed into your bloodstream and reach the brain. During your light sleep, the brain clears out the adenosine. When you wake up, the inceptors are clear and the caffeine has just shown up. You're fresh recharged and ready to go.
Maintain Altitude with Green tea: To keep a steady energy level throughout the day, try replacing high doses of caffeine (such as a giant cup of brewed coffee) with more frequent low doses. Green tea is a great option.
Turbo your Highlight: Try to time your caffeine intake so that you are wired right when you start to highlight.
Disconnect Sugar: It's no secret that many caffeinated drinks are also very sugary: soft drinks such as Coke and Pepsi and sweetened drinks like Snapple's teas and Starbucks mochas. We do suggest you consider separating the caffeine from the sweets.

Go off the grid:

trick yourself meditating: Meditation is just a breather for your brain. Staying quite and noticing your thoughts is refreshing, but ironically, it's also hard work. The act of slowing down and noticing your thoughts is an exertion that leaves you invigorated, just as exercise does. Studies show that it increases working memory and the ability to maintain focus.
Leave your headphone behind: A lot of modern life is spent wearing headphones to fill space in the day that otherwise might be quiet. But if you put on headphones every time you work, walk, exercise, or commute your brain never gets any quiet. Take a break and leave your headphones at home. Just listen to the sounds of traffic, or to the clack of your keyboard, or your footsteps on the pavement. Resist filling the blank space.
Take a real break: It's awfully tempting to check Twitter, Facebook, and other infinity pool app as a break from work. But these kinds of breaks don't renew or relax your brain. For one thing, when you see a troubling news story or an envy-inducing photo from a friend, you feel more stressed, not less.

Make it Personal:

Spend time with your tribe:

Think of one of those energy-giving people.
Go out of your way to have a real conversation wiht her or him.
Afterward, note your energy.

This conversation might be a meal with your family or a phone call to your brother. It can be with an old friend or someone you just met

Sleep in a Cave:

Make your Bedroom a BEDROOM: There's probably one device you'll need to keep in your bedroom: an alarm clock. Choose a simple model with a screen that's not too bright. If possible then keep your alarm clock on a dresser or shelf across the room. This will keep light away from your eyes, and it will help you wake up.
Sneak a nap: Napping makes you smarter. Lots of studies show that napping improves alertness and cognitive performance in the afternoon.

Reflect

Observe
Guess
Experiment
Measure

Every day you'll reflect on whether you made time for your highlight and how well you were able to focus on it. You'll note how much energy you had. You'll review the tactics you used, jot down some observations on what worked and what didn't, and make a plan for which you'll tomorrow.

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