Struggling with a Project? Try Going on a Retreat
There really is no substitute for a distraction-free, dedicated work environment for finishing a big project.
Last summer, when I was trying to write the first draft of my book, I got frustrated with my lack of progress. When I tried to work on it, there was invariably too much other work on my plate that day for me to focus on it. I couldn’t set aside a block of time large enough to fully immerse myself in the book, and I couldn’t hold my mind on it when I knew I had other jobs to complete. If I tried to work on it later in the day after my other work, I was too exhausted to concentrate. The few times that I was able to set a whole day aside, the distractions of daily home life—everything from grocery shopping to playing with my cat—pulled me out of it.
Writing a good first draft of a book or large article requires achieving what’s known as a “flow state”—a situation in which your mind is 100% focused on the task at hand and you’re emotionally motivated to keep going with it. A flow state is characterized by a kind of psychological momentum that propels you through the work. It’s the ideal state for what productivity expert Cal Newport calls “deep work”—work you fully engross your mind in for long periods, as opposed to the “shallow work” that we dip in and out of all the time.
Time seems to pass at a crazy rate when you’re in a flow state, so in order to take full advantage of it you need two things:
Hours of uninterrupted focus time—at least four hours at a time in my experience to really make full use of a good flow state.
A distraction-free environment without TV, housework, social media, or anything that might pull you away from your priority.
I knew I needed to get out of my house and find somewhere I could be free of distractions and work on the book. I needed to be alone, so I could wake up when I chose, work when I chose, eat when I chose, and sleep when I chose. I needed an environment of complete freedom and flexibility so I could capitalize on my natural periods of greatest focus and alertness. I also needed an environment that was meant for work—one my mind associated with productivity and not with leisure, family life, or chores.
I decided to take inspiration from my friend and editor Tim White. In order to complete his recent novel, he traveled to a remote Greek island and shut himself off from the world for nearly two weeks. I was skeptical of how effective it would be, but he came back having drafted all of his lengthy book. So I decided to try it myself, on a more modest budget.
I rented a cottage in the east of England, far enough from home that I wasn’t tempted to go back for anything. I chose somewhere pleasant enough to walk around for inspiration, but small enough to not be too distracting. And—perhaps most crucially—once I got there, I turned off the notifications on all my apps, except for messages from my wife and close family in case of emergencies.
The night I arrived, I had dinner, worked a little on the book, and went to bed as soon as I felt tired. I didn’t set an alarm—I just got up when I had enough energy to work. I pulled my laptop over and worked in bed until midday. I had a late breakfast and worked some more. I went out for a big meal in the evening and worked on into the night. I went to bed when I felt unable to keep at it anymore—even though I wanted to because the flow state was so enjoyable.
I wrote 25,000 words on that four-day retreat—half of the Reason for Living book. The other half took six months to churn out.
The experience was so effective that I’ve left most of the phone notifications I deactivated that week turned off ever since. If I could afford (in terms of both money and time) to take retreats like that every month, I would probably have multiple books in print by now. I’ve managed to repeat the effect on a smaller scale by spending afternoons in my local library or in WeWork spaces, which offer a work-focused environment that helps me achieve more than I do at home, but the sense of freedom from having my own working retreat space takes my productivity to another level.
As many advantages as the current working from home trend may have, there really is no substitute for a distraction-free, dedicated work environment for finishing a big project. If you’re working on a major project, be it a book, a new business, a piece of research, or anything you can do with a laptop and an internet connection, try getting out of your normal working environment and, if you can, go on a retreat. If your mind is anything like mine, it’ll supercharge your productivity.
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