Deep Questions with Cal Newport

This is just we all need in this crazy unrealistic “Grind culture “ we find ourselves in (yeah , grind yourself into the ground!!”) ..Cals Guidance will lead you to being more productive and satisfied in your life and work in a more rational way … I appreciate his easy going style and sense of humor…well worth anybodies time !

Cal is a good productivity guru. When he larps as a broad intellectual figure and advice columnist things go a bit off the rails. So you need to listen to the show the way you’d read Hacker News comments section - there’s occasional gold on technical topics and wildly variable takes on everything else. One episode someone wrote in with climate anxiety and Cal said don’t worry about things outside of your control, go fix a neighborhood playground. Yet it seems when a topic is emotionally salient for Cal, he is unable to resist the twitter rage bait he just spent the previous hour warning listeners about. In these instances his deep intellectualism schtick really just reads as an expertly crafted scaffolding for sounding authoritative. Anyways, I treat the podcast like a weekly devotional for concepts like time blocking and multi scale planning.

I am only 15, but I feel like my life has already changed. This man, Dr. Newport, has pretty much devoted his adult life to helping others see life as something to be used and cherished, and it’s invaluable, from his books about Deep Work and Digital Minimalism (all of which I am reading) to his podcast and other media, it’s truly a gem. Thank you Mr. Newport, for turning my life around from a hyper-connected zombie to an enjoyer of God’s Creation.

I’m pretty far from the typical white-collar knowledge worker whom Cal is usually addressing directly, but I’ve still derived immense benefit from this show. Together with his new book Slow Productivity, it’s the best thing to happen for my time prioritization struggles since first reading Stephen Covey.