Timeboxing

Nir Eyal makes the point bluntly in Indistractable: you cannot call something a distraction unless you know what it distracted you from. A to-do list cannot tell you; it says what, not when. A timeboxed calendar can. Each block is a commitment to one kind of attention for a set span, and the day is judged not by what got done but by whether you did what the block said, because output varies and adherence is the thing you control. Cal Newport calls the same practice time-block planning and redraws the plan whenever the day breaks it, which it will. The value is in the fixed end as much as the fixed start: a block with an end can be protected, and its end is when the messages you postponed get their turn. Eyal adds a sequence for the planning itself: time for yourself first, then relationships, then work, on the grounds that the first two are what get eaten when the third is unbounded.