How Cal Newport rewrote the productivity gospel

Cal Newport is an MIT-trained computer scientist and productivity evangelist who has sold more than 2 million books in 40 languages, offering a sense of control over time, eliminating social media and cultivating boredom.

March 9, 2023 . 10:37 PM

1 min read

Cal Newport is an MIT-trained computer scientist and productivity evangelist who has sold more than 2 million books in 40 languages and 300,000 people download his Deep Questions podcast each month.
On a brisk night in November, a few dozen people huddled into a basement bookstore in Washington DC to hear Cal Newport opine on the state of technology, work and society at large.
Newport’s books offer a sense of control, in this case not over clutter or self, but over time.
Newport came up with the idea of “deep work” during his time at MIT, when he was surrounded by “these brilliant theoreticians”.
Newport’s methodology focuses on increasing focus, eliminating social media and cultivating boredom, which gives the mind the space for creative thinking.