For me personally there are a number of areas that affect my ability to do deep work:
- General internet/news consumption patterns
- Availability of social/news apps on my phone + computer
- Sleeping at least 8.5 hours a night
- Exercising at least every few days
- Meditating for a few minutes in the morning
- Level of burnout eg. have I been overworked or working on unrewarding things for long periods of time
If I do all of these consistently my ability to do deep work increases notably. If I slack in any area it reduces my capacity by some degree. Sleep and burnout are probably the largest contributing factors here. I've found that I just can't cheat on sleep long term without negative consequences, and that if I'm burnt out the only fix is to basically stop working/pushing myself for at least a week until I feel recovered.
I find also that having intention to my day rather than starting out in a reactive mode is key to getting deep work done. If I spend most of my day reacting to things I have trouble doing deep work later in the day, but if I start out with deep work it comes naturally throughout the day.
- General internet/news consumption patterns
- Availability of social/news apps on my phone + computer
- Sleeping at least 8.5 hours a night
- Exercising at least every few days
- Meditating for a few minutes in the morning
- Level of burnout eg. have I been overworked or working on unrewarding things for long periods of time
If I do all of these consistently my ability to do deep work increases notably. If I slack in any area it reduces my capacity by some degree. Sleep and burnout are probably the largest contributing factors here. I've found that I just can't cheat on sleep long term without negative consequences, and that if I'm burnt out the only fix is to basically stop working/pushing myself for at least a week until I feel recovered.
I find also that having intention to my day rather than starting out in a reactive mode is key to getting deep work done. If I spend most of my day reacting to things I have trouble doing deep work later in the day, but if I start out with deep work it comes naturally throughout the day.