Top 5 Productivity Books
They'll set you free
1) Deep Work by Cal Newport- This has to be one of the best books I’ve ever read. I picked it up at a time when I was quite frustrated with my work results. I couldn’t get anything done on time. Procrastination was a way of life.
It helped me understand the concept of flow state and deep work and made me realize its importance. Cal spends a lot of time explaining how most work today is shallow, superficial, and full of distractions. He provides recommendations to get rid of them and get into a ‘deep work’ state more often.
If you haven’t read this already, grab it today. You can thank me later.
2) Indistractable by Nir Eyal - Like Cal, Nir gives some amazing insights into our behavior and what it takes to get to a state of being ‘Indistractable.’ Being Indistractable is a feeling and a state of mind more than anything else.
Each of our actions either reflects traction - moving towards our goals - or distraction - moving away from them. Nir provides a 4 pronged approach to fight distractions
a) Controlling inner triggers
b) Building a schedule around your values
c) Reducing external triggers and
d) Creating precommitments
3) The Productivity Project by Chris Bailey - Chris talks about his journey of becoming obsessed with productivity and his subsequent experiments to figure out productivity secrets.
He has basically experimented with every tip or technique out there and shared his results in this book. It is fascinating to go through those experiments.
The biggest takeaway for me was the concept of energy & attention management along with time management. Your focus is a function of much more than your willpower. What you eat, how you feel, and your mood fluctuations play an important role as well.
The other important idea was the ruthless elimination of the nonessential tasks.
4) The Shallows by Nicholas Carr - Technically, this isn’t a productivity book. However, it is a book that each one of us should read. Shallows talks about the perils of the internet and the online world.
It argues how the internet has changed our brains and made us more impatient, distracted, and non-committed. Carr looks at our evolution journey and highlights the transformative milestones. Internet is one such major milestone, and it is a medium based on interruptions.
There is some amount of pessimism associated with the commentary, but a fascinating read nonetheless.
5) Getting Things Done by David Allen - This one is widely considered the bible of productivity. So much so that there are workshops, seminars, and even peer groups to help folks implement this methodology.
The GTD system has 5 steps
a) Capture everything that has your attention
b) Clarify what each item means
c) Organize them in the right places
d) Reflect and review frequently
e) Engage and execute
Any book that I am missing here? Share in the comments or reply to this email.
Have a productive week ahead. See you next Sunday.