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Comment by norswap | Hacker News Reader

While I'm fond of "deep work the idea", the book was a real disappointment. It's mostly selling the idea instead of explaining how to do something with it.

I followed the author's blog for a while, and I'd say a few key blog posts are enough to get the point accross. Even there it gets repetitive quickly.

The idea is good, it just doesn't require so much elaboration.

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> While I'm fond of "deep work the idea", the book was a real disappointment. It's mostly selling the idea instead of explaining how to do something with it.

Sadly, most self-help book are like this. :-(

Would you be willing to link to what you consider the key blog posts?

Thanks!

It's been a while so I don't remember specifics.

However, after looking around, it seem the category "Patterns of Success for the Working World" (http://calnewport.com/blog/archive/) captures what I thought the interesting content was. It's still 100+ blog posts, so you'll have to do a bit of sorting.

Here's a few from my own quick searching that I found most interesting/foundational/helpful:

http://calnewport.com/blog/2009/07/08/grit-grinds-and-living...

http://calnewport.com/blog/2012/11/21/knowledge-workers-are-...

http://calnewport.com/blog/2009/06/22/on-the-value-of-hard-f...

http://calnewport.com/blog/2009/02/16/the-danger-of-deep-pro...

http://calnewport.com/blog/2008/02/15/fixed-schedule-product...

http://calnewport.com/blog/2011/08/11/the-career-craftsman-m...

https://www.iwillteachyoutoberich.com/blog/getting-started-i...

...aaaaand that's why it may be a good idea to disconnect in order to get any work done.

Well, what to do with deep work is up to you. I wouldn't expect it to be an instruction manual for anything but "Here is how you build your mind and work habits to be able to accomplish deep work."

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