John Zeratsky

Apple reports that people unlock their iPhones an average of 80 times per day, and a 2016 study by customer-research firm Dscout found that people touched their phones an average of 2,617 times per day. Distracted has become the new default.

Every time you check your email or another message service, you’re basically saying, ‘Does any random person need my time right now?’ And if you respond right away, you’re sending another signal both to them and to yourself: ‘I’ll stop what I’m doing to put other people’s priorities ahead of mine no matter who they are or what they want.’ Spelled out, this sounds insane. But instant-response insanity is our culture’s default behavior. It’s the cornerstone of the Busy Bandwagon.

We each spent years in Silicon Valley, where one of the favorite terms is pivot. In startup-speak, a pivot is when a company starts out doing one thing but realizes that a related (or sometimes unrelated) idea is more promising. If they have enough confidence (and funding), they’ll pivot to the new direction.

Look, we love technology. But there is a very serious problem here. Combine the four-plus hours the average person spends on their smartphones with the four-plus hours the average person spends watching television, and distraction is a full-time job.

Small distractions create much larger holes in our day. We call these ‘time craters.’ ... In one of our favorite studies ever, Gloria Mark of the University of California, Irvine found that it takes people twenty-three minutes and fifteen seconds to get back on task after a distraction.

Make Time is a framework for choosing what you want to focus on, building the energy to do it, and breaking the default cycles so that you can start being more intentional about the way you live your life. Even if you don’t completely own your schedule—and few of us do—you absolutely can control your attention