Indistractable with Nir Eyal – Wall Street Best-Selling Author of "Hooked" (GMT058)

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If you value your time, your focus, or your relationships, this episode is a must-listen. Nir Eyal, Wall Street Journal best-selling author of Hooked, just published Indistractable today. As high-achieving marketers and founders, how do we get more meaningful work done in a world full of so many distractions? From the ping of Slack or notifications that you just got mail, inborn tendencies ensure that we’ll always struggle with distraction. However, when you become Indistractable, your attention and your life become your own to focus on tasks to help achieve that next growth milestone.

In episode 58, you’ll learn:

What does it mean to become indistractable?
Four strategies to move from distraction to traction and get deep work done
What are some responsibilities marketers and founders have to creating products that aren’t addictive

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Tweet Some Quotes from This Episode

The opposite of distraction is not focus. It's traction. Distraction is anything that pulls you away from what you want to do. – @nireyal from @GrowthToday podcast. Get the full podcast episode 👇 Click To Tweet The number one source of distraction is internal triggers. We turn to distraction as pain relief from things we don't want to feel or do. - @nireyal from @GrowthToday podcast. Get the full episode 👇 Click To Tweet The definition of indistractable is that you are person who strives to do what they say they are going do. – @nireyal from the @GrowthToday podcast. Get the full episode 👇 Click To Tweet

My Takeaways from This Episode

Make time for traction. In this day and age, if you don’t plan your day, someone else will! Without knowing what it is you want to do with your time, everything is a potential distraction. One of the things I’ve done in the last two weeks since I recorded this with Nir is timebox my schedule. I have tasks blocked out in my calendar. Sometimes I get through my schedule or I do get distracted. But, now I know I’m being distracted from work I need to get done.
Make time for distractions. Yeah! That’s one thing I’ve done as well. I’ve scheduled in times for me to go on social media or YouTube. I’ve even scheduled in times for me to take naps (I work from home most of the times 😄). This helped me really focus on deep work when I’ve scheduled it.
Reduce potential distractions. One of the things I’ve learned is to hack back external triggers. I’ve gone through my apps that I don’t use and turn off notifications when I’m doing work. One way that I get into the state of deep work is listening to music with a rhythmic beat. I like listening to hip-hop jazz or lo-fi music.

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About Nir Eyal

Nir Eyal writes, consults, and teaches about the intersection of psychology, technology, and business. Nir founded two tech companies since 2003 and has taught at the Stanford Graduate School of Business and the Hasso Plattner Institute of Design at Stanford. He is the author of the bestselling book, Hooked: How to Build Habit-Forming Products and Indistractable: How to Control Your Attention and Choose Your Life.

In addition to blogging at NirAndFar.com, Nir’s writing has been featured in The Harvard Business Review, TechCrunch, and Psychology Today.

Show Notes

4:08

Nir’s journey from AmeriCorp to being a Wall Street Journal best selling author of Hooked and Indistractable
9:48

What are some symptoms that someone is becoming too addicted to technology
12:56

What is “akrasia” and how is that related to being distracted?
14:26

How Nir defines distraction and what are the major sources of distraction
18:13

Why it’s important to timebox your day – even your days off and weekends
22:56

What is the “what-the-hell” effect
25:03

Is it worth getting a distraction accountability partner
27:04

How can we make sure that our phones don’t become a major source of distraction?
30:29

What kind of responsibility does marketers and founders have when it comes to creating apps that are not too indistractable?
33:28

After starting and selling companies, what is Nir’s one advice to founders?
34:15

Resources for Indistractable