On a rainy afternoon last weekend, plans got cancelled and I found myself at a loose end. Given that I'm someone who likes to have backup plans for my backup plans, my initial response was panic. Now what? I wandered aimlessly from room to room, grumpily tidying away random items. Noticing for the first time in weeks that most of my houseplants were critically ill, I decided to give them a spa day.
I've been writing code long enough to remember when computers had 5¼-inch floppy drives and exactly zero network cards. Connectivity was a 2400 baud modem talking to a local BBS via the plain old telephone system. The notion of two computers talking to each other was conceivable-but just the two. The Internet was just a twinkle in the eyes of a few DARPA engineers.
A few years ago, I caught myself doing something that made no sense. It was late evening, my kids were asleep, the house finally quiet. I'd been counting down to this moment all day-dreaming of sinking into the couch, wrapping myself in a blanket, maybe even reading a book without distractions. But when I lay down and closed my eyes, something inside me lurched.
I was standing there, frozen in front of the shelves, phone in hand, scrolling through food lists that led to recipes that sucked me into the latest health trends. Ten minutes earlier, I'd come in for a bottle of almond milk. Now I was knee-deep in articles about the "five fruits to reverse aging" and a thread debating which pasture-raised vs organic eggs. My cart sat empty, my body stood still, but my thumb kept moving.
Much of author and Georgetown University computer science professor Cal Newport's work is about preparation. His books Deep Work and Slow Productivity, among others, make the argument for intention around productivity, creativity, collaboration, innovation, rest, reflection, and recovery. In fact, Newport's literary focus is to figure out the best circumstances and cadence for perpetuating creativity. Thatʻs what allows him to do his own writing, maintain his coursework, and generally feel available for new ideas.
