MM#130--Monk Morning Mode

Welcome to the theory to action podcast, where we examine the timeless treasures of wisdom from the great books in less time to help you take action immediately, and ultimately to create and lead a flourishing life. Now, here's your host, David Kaiser.

Hello, I'm David and welcome back to another Mojo minute. Do you find work drudgery? Do you hate going to work? Or what if you could make work feel like not work. But perhaps a place you would enjoy coming to? Most folks, if we really think about it don't look forward to going to their work. Well, Bruce Daisley is hoping to change that mindset. Especially around work with his new book, eat, sleep, work, repeat.

 Again, it's Eat, sleep, work, repeat 30 hacks for bringing joy to your job. It's a very practical book. And in it Daisley lays out these 30 Different hacks based on Route based around three different sections. Part one is titled recharge 12 performance enhancing actions to make work less awful. Part two is called sink. Eight fixes to make teams closer part three is Buzz, the 10 secrets of energize teams. Now the one hack that caught my attention when I first started reading the book was from part one recharge. And Daisley introduces us to this by saying it's quote going into monk mode, morning, unquote. Sorry, having a monk morning mode. Those were his words. So in this particular section and hack in the book days, it goes on with tons of evidence about how in most businesses the work floor plan. And the way it's set up is in a quote open space format. Wanting to encourage more group discussion and more collaboration. This seems very well intended, obviously. But when you study and hear the particular effects on workers, and those open floor plans, the opposite comes out. Daisley does a great job producing the evidence from many scientific researchers. But let's go to the book for our first pullquote. 

Business School professor Sophie Leroy, describe what's going on here, quote, people need to stop thinking about one task in order to fully transition their attention and perform well on another she explained yet results indicate it is very difficult for people to transition their attention away from an unfinished task and their subsequent tasks performance suffers. Leroy says when we switch from one job answering an email say to another like writing a presentation there is an intention, attention residue. We are still half thinking about whether the email response was right or when our boss will get back to us. The end result is we spend longer doing a less thorough job. Some scientists have gone so far as to suggest that when we mentally multitask our IQ get this our IQ is reduced as much as 10 points. For all intents and purposes. We may even be stoned. Continuing on with the book, constant interruptions and distractions also make us feel like we're getting less done. And this has a significant impact on our sense of personal worth. Psychologist Teresa Amelie who has done extensive research in this area has established that people feel satisfied at work when they are confident that they have made progress at something not powering through a mountain of email but focusing on a single task. It's something that Hungarian American psychologist me Hi Chicks bi describes as quote flow checks me highs words flow in check me highs words flow is being quote completely involved in an activity for its own sake. The eagle the eagle falls away time flies every action movement and thought flows inevitably from the previous one like playing jazz, your whole being is involved. And you are using your skills to the utmost, unquote.


Sounds like we all need to get some flow into our lives. We're going to check out me hi checks me i, and I'm probably pronouncing her word, or her last name wrong, but she has come up repeatedly in all my readings. So I gotta check her out. But did you catch this phrase, quote, constant interruptions. And distractions make us feel like we're getting less done, unquote. Because in fact, you are multitasking is a myth and Daisley as well as many, many other authors hammer this point home, over and over with tons of evidence. So please indulge me at this point, as I share a little piece of my story. I'll take you back behind the scenes a little bit. But if you've been listening to these Mojo minutes at all, for any amount of time, you will know, two of my most favorite and most recommended books are the Miracle Morning by Hal Elrod, and Deep Work by Cal Newport. And the reason that I have? 

Well, the reason, let me go back, the reason that I love both of them is because on their face, both of those books are very, very good. But I have combined both books. And they're great ideas to make my own little hack. And those two great ideas are starting 90% of my mornings with a combination of reading and writing. Without any distractions in the very quiet of an early early morning, I purposely do not open my perk, my personal or work email, I purposely do not turn on the TV. And I purposely do not read any news of any kind, I wake up I pray. Then I make my morning pre workout drink. That's my version of coffee, I don't drink coffee. And then I start reading and writing. But here's the funny and that's kind of the cool thing too. And I stole this idea from Steven Pressfield, the author we discovered in do the work. It's a great little book, by the way. And I love to hear about how other authors or other writers go about doing their writing, I always find I find that fascinating. Kind of like if you're a basketball player, you want to watch the greats, play basketball so you can pick up on any tips. If you're a great piano player, you want to watch, you know the equivalent of a Mozart in our day, how they go about doing their craft. 

And Pressfield said somewhere that he drapes his favorite sweatshirt over the chair, his riding chair. So in the early morning, he simply puts on his favorite sweatshirt sits down and then begins writing. And I thought that was kind of cool. So roughly about five years ago, and I began doing the same kind of practice but I love hoodies. And what you know, it is kind of caught on now that I will drape a hoodie over the chair, my writing chair, whatever it's going to be if I'm in a hotel, I drape it over the hotel chair, if I'm here at home, I drape it over my my my big chair here. And this is kind of the Uber cool part because I wanted to become my own person. Some time ago, I don't know when this actually began, but I would pull the hood up when I put it on. But then I would keep the hood up the whole time. I was in my deep work session my morning deep work session. So it's usually about an hour, hour and a half. And that comes to us from the deep work big idea from Cal Newport. 

So be sure to check out that book too. But in my mind, I kind of envisioned myself going into monk mode. That's what I've always kind of described that this morning mode. And my local Catholic churches run by Dominican friars who still maintain the traditional habit. And so I'm always seeing monks around me, even though they're very much in the secular world. They're not in a monastery. They're in the you know, they run our parish, and they run many other parishes around the country around the world for that matter. But I'm always seeing monks around me with their traditional hoods. So Do them for like the hour or hour and a half on most mornings, I feel like I'm going into monk mode. Kinda cool A.

So that's a long way around the mountain to tell you how cool it was for me to come across this hack from Brad Daisley. about going into quote, Monk mode. And I really perked up when I began reading this great nugget of wisdom. So let's go back to the book for another quote. This may seem counter to what we're often told about creative creativity these days. That it's a collective effort. It's all about teams. And at a certain point, of course, it is in a group discussion can happen productively in open workspaces designed for Nevertheless, our meaningful work is likely more to come. And more to be done when we're in solitude. If you've ever found yourself saying, I can't get anything done at work, or I go to the office, before everyone else gets in, because I can power through my work, then you're quietly recognizing this too. This is the Copart writer and academic Cal Newport has his own term for the flow. This involves, quote, deep work defined by him as professional activities performed in a state of distraction free concentration that pushes your cognitive capacities to the limit. And he has a press practical suggestion for how to achieve it. 

Quote, I'm starting to see more entrepreneurs. He told me, especially CEOs of small startups doing what I call monk mode morning, where they say as far as I'm concerned, I'm reachable starting at 11am or noon, I'm never available for meetings. Until then, I'm never going to answer my email, and I'm never going to answer the phone before then. Their whole organization adapts to this idea. And that's the first part of the day in depth time. As he says, the second part of the day is for other things. It's an approach that resonates with Emily's recommendation that we adopt a mixed model of work, a blend of quiet time and commingling to Emma belly. Getting meaningful work done means ruthlessly guarding and protecting blocks of the workweek shielding staff from distractions and interruptions that are the normal condition of organizational life. Unquote. 

How cool is that? How cool was it that Daisley reached out for Cal Newport to interview him? And that cow shares his great nugget of wisdom about the morning? Nope, the monk mode morning with his version of deep work. And again, I love love. You guys know this when two authors overlap in their brilliant nuggets of wisdom. So let's close this Mojo minute with one more quote I wanted to share. Quote, how about trying this out? Why not tell your team that on say Wednesday or Friday? You won't be getting into the office until 11am. And you'll be working on things at home until then. One of my colleagues at Twitter has tried a version of monk mode morning. Say that fast 18 times. Monk mode morning. And David wilding has a fiendish two hour commute each way to work. He decided that getting on a train during rush hour was wasted time. You don't get a table you're squeezed against strangers. So he chooses to get a slightly later train where he considered a table and thanks to the rails, the rail operators lack of Wi Fi, concentrate on deeper work projects rather than email and Work Chat. He may not be in the office at 9:30am On days when he has scheduled a late train but by the time he arrives his monk mode morning has given him an hour or more valuable deep work. Unquote. I couldn't agree more with Mr. Daisley deep work has we have shared on this podcast and a three part series. It's the superpower of the 21st century. 

So be sure to go back and listen to Mojo minutes. 8182 and 83. The 21st century superpower superpower part two deep work habit and superpower number three or superpower part three, the Holy Grail, all good stuff right there.

So in today's Mojo minute if you are feeling that you're not accomplishing anything at work, if you're getting distracted and constantly interrupted, make an appeal to your boss for an hour, an hour and a half of uninterrupted time to write that presentation, or that important email to your top customer. getting ourselves into a deep work state, or in this case, going into monk mode is extremely, extremely fulfilling. I can share this because for the last almost, I guess, 140 episodes of these Mojo minutes, you would have seen me with my favorite hoodie on in the morning. And yes, that hood would be up. And I would be in monk mode morning. Only I didn't call it that them. Now I'm going to thank you, Brad Daisley How about you? Will you try your own version of monk morning mode in your life? If you do, you will develop your own style and you will I promise find tons of productivity fulfillment, guaranteed. And here's to finding your favorite hoodie to

thank you for joining us. We hope you enjoyed this theory to action podcast. Be sure to check out our show page at T Mojo academy.com where we have everything we discussed in this podcast as well as other great resources. Until next time, keep getting your mojo on