265: Free Time Crossover — Eliminate Email with Cal Newport

Thank you for your patience as I've been in super deep work hibernation mode behind the scenes! I launched my new podcast Free Time in March of this year. And I'm really excited to bring you a crossover episode, one of the early listener favorites 02: Cal Newport on his latest book, A World Without Email. I have also been working very diligently this year on my next book that launches in March of 2022, it's called Free Time: Lose the Busy Work, Love Your Business. We just sent the book to the printer. So it is now out of my hands and I'm starting to work on building the launch engine. So I have about six months and I'm planning some really cool things. If you want to get a front row seat to the behind the launch process, I encourage you to sign up for the Time Well Spent newsletter because that's where I'll be making most of the early announcements. Just visit itsfreetime.com and throw in your name and email because of course I'm planning a bunch of bonuses and some community around it, too, especially for those of you who want to possibly be part of a launch. Thanks for your patience as I've been a little spotty releasing episodes here. I know that I have been, as I am trying to sort of toggle things to the foreground and background. It was really helpful to give such singular focus to the book. And in fact, if you want to hear more about that and why I sort of went all in on the book with my time, energy and attention check out episode 26 of the FreeTime podcast, Five Trade-offs of a Longterm Singular Focus. As I mentioned in a previous episode, I'm still planning on releasing episodes here every two weeks. So thank you for being here, listening some of you all the way since we launched back in 2015, I really, really appreciate it. And I hope you enjoy this episode from free time with Cal Newport without further ado here. “Stab the Hydra in the heart.” Cal Newport is not pulling any punches with his latest treatise on how we can combat Hyperactive Hive Mind with smarter systems for communication. Email has become a constant source of guilt and stress for so many of us — listen in for strategies to reclaim your peace and focus. About Cal Newport: Cal Newport is an Associate Professor of Computer Science at Georgetown University. He is the author of six books, including Deep Work, which argues that focus is the new I.Q. in the modern workplace. His latest, A World Without Email: Reimagining Work in an Age of Communication Overload, is in many ways his magnum opus on the topic of technology and the workplace. Be sure to also check out his podcast, Deep Questions. Key questions: How can you approach email as a process observer (and architect), not a do-er? What people or workflows can you put in place to eliminate email? Where are you still reacting to the Hyperactive Hive Mind? What experiment can you run this week? ❤️ Enjoying the show? Please leave a rating or review. Free Time is listener supported—consider donating to become a podcast Insider and you’ll get access to a private monthly Q&A call: 📘 Books Mentioned: Pivot, A World Without Email, Digital Minimalism, Deep Work, So Good They Can’t Ignore You 🔗 Links Mentioned: Cal on the web...and he’s not on Twitter! Or Facebook. 🎙Related Podcasts: 122: Digital Minimalism with Cal Newport, 29: Deep Work: Ditch Cognitive Junk Food with Cal Newport 💌 Subscribe to the Time Well Spent newsletter: http://itsfreetime.com/join 💸 Enroll in the complimentary Free-up Founder Time mini-course 💬 I’d love to hear what’s on your mind! Take the Free Time listener survey 🗣 Submit a voice question or comment for future episodes: http://itsfreetime.com/ask 🎧 Make sure you’re subscribed wherever you listen to ‘casts: 📝 Check out full show notes and links from this episode and share it with a friend! http://itsfreetime.com/episodes/002 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices