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Last month, a 22-year-old entrepreneur named Emil Barr published a Wall Street Journal op-ed boasting a provocative title:​ “‘Work-Life Balance’ Will Keep You Mediocre.”​ He opens with a spicy take: “I’m 22 and I’ve built two companies that together are valued at more than $20 million…When people ask how I did it, the answer isn’t what they expect—or want—to hear. I eliminated work-life balance entirely and just worked. When you front-load success early, you buy the luxury of choice for the rest of your life.” As Barr elaborates, when starting his first company, he slept only three and a half hours per night. “The physical and mental toll was brutal: I gained 80 pounds, lived on Red Bull and struggled with anxiety,” he writes. “But this level of intensity was the only way to build a multimillion-dollar company.” He ends the piece with a wonderfully cringe-inducing flourish. “I plan to become a billionaire by age 30,” he writes. “Then I will have the time and resources to tackle problems close to my heart like climate change, species extinction and economic inequality.” (Hold for applause.) It’s easy to mock Barr’s twenty-something bravado, even if I do have to be careful not to be the pot calling the kettle black (​ahem​). Yet, some of this knee-jerk mockery might stem from the uncomfortable realization that beneath this performative busyness, there may lie a kernel of truth. Are we forfeiting our opportunity to make a meaningful impact with our work if we prioritize balance too much? As NYU professor Suzy Welch noted, “I do give [Barr] points for saying something I only mutter to my M.B.A. students …You cannot well-being yourself to wealth.” To help address these fears, let’s turn to the advice of another twenty-something: me. In ​an essay I published when I was all of 27​—around the time I was finishing my doctoral dissertation at MIT—I wrote the following: “I found writing my thesis to be similar to writing my books. It’s an exercise in grit: You have to apply hard focus, almost every day, over a long period of time. To me, this is the definition of what I call hard work. The important point, however, is that the regular blocks of hard focus that comprise hard work do not have to be excessively long. That is, there’s nothing painful or unsustainable about hard work. With only a few exceptions, for example, I was easily able to maintain my fixed 9 to 5:30 schedule while writing my thesis. By contrast, the work schedule [followed by many graduate students] meets the definition of what I call hard to do work. Working 14 hours a day, with no break, for months on end, is very hard to do! It exhausts you. It’s painful. It’s impossible to sustain. I’m increasingly convinced that a lot of student stress is caused by a failure to recognize the difference between these two work types. Students feel that big projects should be hard, so hard to do habits seem a natural fit. I am hoping that by explicitly describing the alternative of doing plain hard work, I can help convince you that the hard to do strategy is a terrible way to tackle large…challenges.” I gave that article a simple, declarative title: ​Focus Hard. In Reasonable Bursts. One Day at a Time.​ This strategy has continued to serve me well. I’m now 43 years old and, I suppose, still managing to avoid mediocrity—all while continuing to rarely work past 5:30 p.m. I’m not willing to sacrifice all the other things I care about in order to grind. Barr is still young, and his body is resilient enough to get away with his hustle for a while longer. I hope, however, that those who found his message appealing might also hear mine. Deep results require disciplined, relentless action over a long period of time, and this is a very different commitment than the type of unfocused freneticism lionized by Barr. I work hard almost every day. But those days are rarely hard to get through. This distinction matters. The post Does Work-Life Balance Make You Mediocre? appeared first on Cal Newport. View the full article

Additional levies over Russian oil purchases raise rates on New Delhi to among the highest in the worldView the full article

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Despite an initial mood of wartime solidarity, Iranians across the political spectrum believe the conflict has exposed the vulnerabilities of the systemView the full article

Governor Lisa Cook has vowed to challenge her dismissal in a case that is likely to end up at the Supreme CourtView the full article

The new affiliate, NAF Insurance Services, is teaming up with The Baldwin Group to offer a range of coverage from more than 50 carriers nationwide. View the full article

The bank "temporarily" paused home equity line of credit lending in April 2020, over concerns regarding the economic impact of the Covid-19 pandemic. View the full article

Change to border rules aims to address high number of males being sent abroad by their parents before they reach 18View the full article

Legal experts say President The President's unprecedented move to fire Cook over alleged past misconduct will likely be hashed out in court, but there is little precedent to determine whether a sitting board governor can be removed for past actions. View the full article

A proposed rule published Tuesday in the Federal Register would limit the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau's ability to designate nonbank entities for supervision. View the full article

The judge sided with Massachusetts officials in a review of their lawsuit against Hometap, who pushed back on descriptions of its products as "illegal" loans. View the full article

The president’s intensifying assault on central bank independence risks backfiringView the full article

In the years since ChatGPT’s launch in late 2022, it’s been hard not to get swept up in feelings of euphoria or dread about the looming impacts of generative AI. This reaction has been fueled, in part, by the confident declarations of tech CEOs, who have veered toward increasingly bombastic rhetoric. “AI is starting to get better than humans at almost all intellectual tasks,” Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei recently told Anderson Cooper. He added that half of entry-level white collar jobs might be “wiped out” in the next one to five years, creating unemployment levels as high as 20%—a peak last seen during the Great Depression. Meanwhile, OpenAI’s Sam Altman said that AI can now rival the abilities of a job seeker with a PhD, leading one publication to plaintively ask, “So what’s left for grads?”​ Not to be outdone, Mark Zuckerberg claimed that superintelligence is “now in sight.” (His shareholders hope he’s right, as he’s reportedly offering compensation packages worth up to $300 million to lure top AI talent to Meta.) But then, two weeks ago, OpenAI finally released its long-awaited GPT-5, a large language model that many had hoped would offer leaps in capabilities, comparable to the head-turning advancements introduced by previous major releases, such as GPT-3 and GPT-4. But the resulting product seemed to be just fine. GPT-5 was marginally better than previous models in certain use cases, but worse in others. It had some nice new usability updates, but others that some found annoying. (Within days, more than 4,000 ChatGPT users signed a change.org petition asking OpenAI to make their previous model, GPT-4o, available again, as they preferred it to the new release.) An early YouTube reviewer concluded that GPT-5 was a product that “was hard to complain about,” which is the type of thing you’d say about the iPhone 16, not a generation-defining technology. AI commentator Gary Marcus, who had been predicting this outcome for years, summed up his early impressions succinctly when he called GPT-5 “overdue, overhyped, and underwhelming.” This all points to a critical question that, until recently, few would have considered: Is it possible that the AI we are currently using is basically as good as it’s going to be for a while? ​In my most recent article for The New Yorker, which came out last week, I sought to answer this question. In doing so, I ended up reporting on a technical narrative that’s not widely understood outside of the AI community. The breakthrough performance of the GPT-3 and GPT-4 language models was due to improvements in a process called pretraining, in which a model digests an astonishingly large amount of text, effectively teaching itself to become smarter. Both of these models’ acclaimed improvements were caused by increasing their size as well as the amount of text on which they were pretrained. At some point after GPT-4’s release, however, the AI companies began to realize that this approach was no longer as effective as it once was. They continued to scale up model size and training intensity, but saw diminishing returns in capability gains. In response, starting around last fall, these companies turned their attention to post-training techniques, a form of training that takes a model that has already been pretrained and then refines it to do better on specific types of tasks. This allowed AI companies to continue to report progress on their products’ capabilities, but these new improvements were now much more focused than before. Here’s how I explained this shift in my article: “A useful metaphor here is a car. Pre-training can be said to produce the vehicle; post-training soups it up. [AI researchers had] predicted that as you expand the pre-training process you increase the power of the cars you produce; if GPT-3 was a sedan, GPT-4 was a sports car. Once this progression faltered, however, the industry turned its attention to helping the cars that they’d already built to perform better.” The result was a confusing series of inscrutably named models—o1, o3-mini, o3-mini-high, -4-mini-high—each with bespoke post-training upgrades. These models boasted widely-publicized increases on specific benchmarks, but no longer the large leaps in practical capabilities we once expected. “I don’t hear a lot of companies using AI saying that 2025 models are a lot more useful to them than 2024 models, even though the 2025 models perform better on benchmarks,” Gary Marcus told me. The post-training approach, it seems, can lead to incrementally better products, but not the continued large leaps in ability that would be necessary to fulfill the tech CEO’s more outlandish predictions. None of this, of course, implies that generative AI tools are worthless. They can be very cool, especially when used to help with computer programming (though maybe not as much as some thought), or to conduct smart searches, or to power custom tools for making sense of large quantities of text. But this paints a very different picture from one in which AI is “better than humans at almost all intellectual tasks.” For more details on this narrative, including a concrete prediction for what to actually expect from this technology in the near future, read the full article. But in the meantime, I think it’s safe, at least for now, to turn your attention away from the tech titans’ increasingly hyperbolic claims and focus instead on things that matter more in your life. The post What if AI Doesn’t Get Much Better Than This? appeared first on Cal Newport. View the full article

The end-of-summer slump is real. You’re saying goodbye to all of the joy that summer had to offer, but you haven’t yet shifted into high gear for a productive fall. The result is this weird middle place where you know it’s time to jump into action, and your mind is ready to do so, but The post Stuck in the end-of-summer slump? Here’s how to rebuild your momentum. appeared first on RescueTime Blog. View the full article

Subscribe to Work LifeGet stories like this in your inbox Subscribe Most of our work calendars are chock full of appointments we can’t miss: Team meetings, project huddles, performance reviews – you name it. But have you ever made an appointment with yourself, and treated it with the same level of commitment? That’s the idea behind time-blocking, the practice of reserving time on your own calendar to knock out specific projects. This has two big benefits: First, it carves out space in your workday to accomplish important tasks that otherwise might get pushed to the sidelines. Second, it reduces the temptation to try to multi-task your way through a giant to-do list (spoiler alert: multi-tasking is impossible). “You’re trying to curb the effect of bouncing from thing to thing. You don’t want to be a ping-pong ball trying to get through your day,” says Krissy Metzler, an executive function coach. What is time-blocking? “Time blocking is appointments with yourself to do specific work,” says Alexis Haselberger, a time management and productivity coach. Think of it this way: In the same way you might have an hour-long time slot blocked for a Zoom meeting, you might reserve an hour on your calendar to prepare slides for an upcoming presentation. It’s about giving the tasks on your to-do list a specific time on your schedule where you will work on them (and nothing else). Time blocks can be one-off and project specific, but they can also be repeating elements on your calendar. For example, you might create a recurring daily block on your schedule from 9-9:30am to catch up on your email. The important thing to remember is that time-blocking only works if you treat these appointments seriously, allowing yourself the time to work on the task without being responsible to anything – or anyone – else. Why is time-blocking effective? Time-blocking works so well because it corrects for our tendency to get pulled in too many directions. “We are hard-wired as humans to get distracted,” Metzler says. We have a desire to take care of things as soon as they pop up, playing whack-a-mole with every task during our work day. Time-blocking helps you resist this temptation by giving everything its proper place. Metzler explains it this way: Imagine you’re in the middle of a time block working on a project for Client A, when someone pops by your desk to talk about Client B. You know you have a separate time block later in your day for Client B, so you can confidently say, “I hear you, I have time later to think about Client B,” which gives you permission to continue focusing on Client A without context-switching. Time-blocking also has another benefit: It forces you to be more realistic with your to-do list, Haselberger says. That’s because time-blocking acts as a visual representation of how long tasks will take to complete, and might help you realize you’ve taken on too much. Over time, this awareness can prevent you from over-committing at work: Once your calendar is full, you know you don’t realistically have time to take on more tasks. Two ways to incorporate time-blocking into your day Depending on your needs and preferences, there are two ways you can incorporate time-blocking into your work life. Put it right on your work calendar This is the most direct way of time-blocking. When you need an hour to complete a project, add that as an event to the same work calendar that houses your other meetings. Your coworkers won’t be able to schedule over your time blocks, and you’ll show as “busy” during that time. The benefit of this approach is that it truly protects your time blocks from being scheduled over, Haselberger says. The downside is that your coworkers might get frustrated if your calendar suddenly has a lot less availability for meetings. Create a secondary time-blocking calendar If you’re not feeling bold enough to make hard boundaries on your work calendar, you can create a secondary calendar that only you have access to. This “overlay,” as Haselberger describes it, would allow you to see your own time blocks, but wouldn’t show up on your official work calendar. The benefit here is that it allows flexibility if someone does need to schedule a meeting with you. But that’s also the downside: Nothing is stopping your coworkers from booking over all your time blocks. How to come up with time estimates No matter the method you choose, any time-blocking system relies on accurate estimates of how long a task will take to complete. Creating these estimates is a skill in itself, Metzler says. It’s normal in the beginning for your estimates to be off, and it’s common for people to take longer than they expect to complete a task. Metzler suggests asking yourself these questions to create more accurate estimates: Do I have all the information I need to start this task? (If not, you need time to gather the information) Am I in a good headspace? (If you’re working with low energy, for example, this will impact your efficiency) Do I have a clear vision of what needs to be done? (Or, put another way, is your team aligned on their goals?) Then, after you complete a task, it’s essential to reflect on how long it actually took. Did it take more or less time than you expected, and why? Digging into the “why” is really important for understanding how to create more accurate time estimates in the future, Metzler says. Once you get the hang of this, you can make your life easier by creating a “cheat sheet” for how long it takes you to complete common or repeating tasks. “Don’t store things in your brain rent-free,” Metzler says. You might also find that you have a consistent “off-ratio” for time blocks, Haselberger says. For example, if tasks almost always take you 1.5x as long as you expect, you can add that 1.5x multiplier to your time estimates going forward. Common time-blocking mistakes to avoid Creating time blocks that are too vague: Time-blocking is most effective when we get specific about the tasks for each block, Haselberger. Don’t just set aside an hour for “deep work,” but rather name the specific task or project you want to work on during that time. Overscheduling your day: You might be really excited to try time-blocking, but don’t overdo it. If you overschedule yourself by time-blocking every moment of your day with no buffers, it can actually become a barrier to productivity, according to Metzler. “That’s too much pressure on ourselves, and it’s not conducive to remaining flexible,” she says. Instead, she advises starting with three time blocks and getting used to those for a few weeks before you add more to your daily schedule. Neglecting the necessities: Don’t forget to make time for things like checking email or taking lunch breaks. Those deserve a time block in your schedule, too, Metzler says. Because if you don’t reserve time to do those things, they can easily fall by the wayside. (Skipping lunch doesn’t help your efficiency or productivity, Metzler notes). Getting pulled out of your time blocks for something urgent: This is a common pitfall, Metzler says, and calls for some reflection. She says that often we see things as “urgent” when they actually aren’t. They might be important, but could potentially wait until after your time block. When you get pulled away like this, think about whether you can handle it differently the next time something “urgent” comes up. Not having any time to time-block in the first place: You might look at your calendar, chock full of meetings, and conclude there’s no open time to start time-blocking for other tasks. If this is the case, Haselberger suggests doing a “meeting audit” to try to free up some space in your calendar. Deleting (or not honoring) your time blocks: As much as you tell yourself a time block is an appointment with yourself, you might still feel tempted to ignore it on a busy day. This is where Haselberger has a rule for herself: She’s never allowed to delete a time block, she can only move it. So instead of blowing past it, she’ll reschedule it and find a time to get that work done. Subscribe to Work LifeGet stories like this in your inbox Subscribe The post How to use time-blocking to get more work done appeared first on Work Life by Atlassian. View the full article

Highly productive teams make long-term business success possible. Not only do they meet deadlines and reach quarterly goals consistently, but they also shape company culture, boost morale, and create a competitive edge that compounds over time. But building a high-performing team takes a plan for improving accountability and overall work habits.According to the ThinkWise Impact of The post Team time tracking and team goals set the stage for long-term success appeared first on RescueTime Blog. View the full article

Subscribe to Work LifeGet stories about tech and teams in your inbox Subscribe By the time you finish this article, your brain will be different. The reason for this cerebral shift is neuroplasticity _ the brain’s ability to change and restructure itself. Every time the brain processes new information, neurons fire, new pathways form, and the malleable brain alters its shape and structure. In recent years, several researchers have posited that it’s possible to consciously direct neuroplasticity to optimize brain function, improve work performance, and even influence team performance. What is neuroplasticity? In a nutshell, neuroplasticity is the brain’s ability to learn and adapt. Until relatively recently, experts believed that our brains were fixed by the end of adolescence and that, in terms of neurons, it was all downhill from there. But the latest research has proved the opposite: that our brains can actually grow and change throughout adulthood. That is, if we treat our neural pathways right. “The main point of neuroplasticity is that you can actually form and reorganize connections in your brain,” says Dr. Marsha Chinichian, a Los Angeles-based clinical psychotherapist and the brains behind acclaimed mental fitness app Mindshine. Related Article Alpha brain waves are associated with a flow state of mind. Here’s how to ride yours By Trish Sammer In Productivity “For a long time we thought that humans were born with a ton of neurons, synapses, and connections, and as we got older, they simply died off. But now we’ve learned that isn’t true. We can actually make changes to further develop our brains. We’ve learned we can actually rewire our brains.” Dr. Chinichian’s enthusiasm is echoed by other leading cognitive experts around the world, including Natalia Ramsden, a business psychologist and founder of SOFOS Associates in London, the UK’s first and only brain optimization clinic. “There’s something hugely empowering about the idea that we, as individuals, can actually change the structure of our brains for the better,” says Ramsden. “There’s so much we can do to develop their function, which in turn can dramatically increase our productivity in the workplace.” Make better decisions and prevent cognitive fatigue So how do we put neuroplasticity into action in our day-to-day working lives? Imagine your brain as a colossal power grid. Billions of pathways light up every time you think, feel, or do something. Putting neuroplasticity into action means carving new pathways, while strengthening the best of the existing ones – and not reinforcing the pathways you’d rather avoid. Neuroscientist Dr. Tara Swart, a senior lecturer at MIT and author of bestselling brain bible The Source, recently compared this process to road building. “Think of it as going from a dirt road to a motorway,” Dr. Swart told European CEO. “I could say, ‘I’m going to work on that pathway, which is currently a dirt road. The more I use it, and the more I repeat activities, I can build it up to a motorway.’” That newly-built motorway will not only able to help you process information faster, it will also be better equipped to stave off mental fatigue. That means less stress and fewer mistakes. “It can help to think of your brain in terms of a muscle,” says Dr. Lynda Shaw, a chartered psychologist and cognitive neuroscientist who is a Fellow of The Royal Society of Medicine and an Associate Fellow of the British Psychological Society. “If you do enough bicep curls you’ll increase the size of your biceps. It’s the same process with your brain. If you exercise your brain correctly and often, neuroplasticity means it will become more powerful.” From a remote working perspective – especially with companies like Atlassian deciding to make the arrangement permanent – experts say that neuroplasticity is an even more valuable tool, as daily office stimuli dramatically decrease, and new routines and rituals come to the fore. “We need, as bosses, to encourage our people to embrace change and adapt by being innovative and creative,” says Dr. Shaw. “Neuroplasticity is a great way of doing that, and of teams staying ahead of that curve.” Below, our experts suggest their top tips for harnessing the power of neuroplasticity for yourself. Related Article 8 proven leadership principles and the psychology behind them By Kat Boogaard In Leadership 9 techniques to “rewire” your cognitive pathways 1. Feed your brain Your brain makes up only a tiny proportion of your total body weight, but it uses up a quarter of everything you eat. If you want enhanced neural pathways, you’ll need an enhanced diet. According to Ramsden, that means grabbing snacks like walnuts, blueberries, and avocado during the day. Vitamin D and magnesium are top priorities if you want to promote neuroplasticity. 2. Take naps Obviously a good night’s sleep (ideally between seven and nine hours) will always set you up for a better brain day. But a short afternoon nap of around 20 minutes will elevate your neuroplasticity potential even further. A short nap encourages the growth of dendritic spines, which act as crucial connectors between the neurons in your brain. 3. Don’t let the work day linger Like muscle-building, neuroplasticity needs downtime in order to do its work properly. According to Dr. Chinichian, managers should embed and enforce a “close the day” ritual that prioritizes reflection and gratitude for small wins. An end-of-day Slack message saying “Thanks for the great ideas in the brainstorming session today, everyone. See you tomorrow,” can help the team feel valued. Putting a hard stop to the stresses of the day in a way that also boosts endorphins creates perfect conditions for neuroplasticity. Bonus: it also sends the signal that it’s OK to “leave” work and unplug for the evening. 4. Expand your vocabulary Try to learn one new word every day. According to experts, this simple act will spark a multitude of new neural pathways, both visual and auditory. (Give it a few months and it’ll make you unstoppable at Scrabble too). Related Article How to work with all the Myers-Briggs personality types By Trish Sammer In Leadership 5. Use the “wrong” hand Non-dominant hand exercises are excellent for forming new neural pathways, as well as strengthening the connectivity between existing neurons. For instance, if you’re right-handed, try brushing your teeth with your left hand – and then try it while balancing on one leg for a double neuroplasticity bonus. 6. Learn to juggle Juggling is frequently cited as an excellent means for improving neuroplasticity. Keep a small set of balls in your work drawer for a brain boost whenever you have a few spare seconds between tasks. The better you get, the bigger the benefits. 7. Play chess Indulge your inner Beth Harmon by embracing chess – a game that has endless potential for neuroplasticity. Chess players have significantly more grey matter in their anterior cingulate cortex than those unfamiliar with en passant and castling. And you don’t even need another player or a board in order to reap the mental benefits. Simply log onto chess.com for a quick blast whenever you have a few minutes. (You don’t need to finish a game to get the neurological boost.) 8. Do mnemonic drills Teaching yourself mnemonic devices, like formulas or rhymes, can enhance connectivity in your prefrontal parietal network, paving the way to new, positive pathways in your brain. Get started here. 9. Be mindful, as a team Chinichian says that one of the best things you can do to promote neuroplasticity in a workforce is to incorporate regular group meditation. There are multiple online options available to get you started, like this and this. Not only does it help with the positive brain rewiring process (while expanding several useful parts of the brain), it also results in team members reacting to problems with an increased sense of calm, passion, and awareness. Neuroplasticity at its finest. Subscribe to Work LifeGet stories like this in your inbox Subscribe The post 9 neuroplasticity exercises to boost productivity appeared first on Work Life by Atlassian. View the full article

A reader recently sent me ​a Substack post​ they thought I might like. “I bought my kids an old-school phone to keep smartphones out of their hands while still letting them chat with friends,” the post’s author, Priscilla Harvey, writes. “But it’s turned into the sweetest, most unexpected surprise: my son’s new daily conversations with his grandmothers.” As Harvey continues, her son has adopted the habit of stretching out on the couch, talking to his grandmother on a retro rotary-style phone, the long cable stretching across the room. “There’s no scrolling, no distractions, no comparisons, no dopamine hits to chase,” she notes. “Instead he is just listening to stories, asking questions, and having the comfort of knowing someone who loves him is listening on the other end of the line.” The post’s surface message is one about kids and technology. Harvey, defiantly pushed back against the culture of weary resignation surrounding our youth and phone use, and discovered something sacred. But I think there’s a more general idea lurking here as well. The telephone, in its original hard-plastic, curly-wired form, is an example of what we might call an additive technology. Its goal is to take something you value—like talking to people you know—and make this activity easier and more accessible. You want to talk to your grandmother? Dial her number, and her voice fills your ear, clear and immediate. The phone seeks strictly to add value to your life. Now compare this to Instagram. The value proposition is suddenly muddled. You might enjoy aspects of this app: the occasional diversion, the rare update from a cherished friend. But with these joys come endless sorrows as well. The scrolling can become worryingly addictive, while the content tends to devolve into a digital slurry—equal parts mind-numbing and anxiety-inducing. Unlike the straightforward benefits of a landline, it soon becomes clear that this tool doesn’t have your best interests as its primary goal. It’s using you; making itself just compelling enough that you’ll pick it up, at which point it can monetize every last ounce of your time and data. It’s what we might call an extractive technology, as it seeks to extract value from you instead of providing it. ​My philosophy of techno-selectionism​ builds on a simple belief: we must become significantly more critical and choosy about the tools we allow into our lives. This goal becomes complicated when we filter our choices based solely on whether something can plausibly offer us any benefit. Nearly everything passes that low bar. But if we distinguish between additive and extractive technologies, clarity emerges. The key is not whether that app, device, or site is flashy or potentially cool. What matters is whose interest it ultimately serves. If it’s not our own, why bother? Life’s too short to miss time on the phone with grandma. The post On Additive and Extractive Technologies appeared first on Cal Newport. View the full article

If you’re feeling disoriented as summer ends, you’re not alone. Summer is a memory-making season, and a lot of that is because we let things slide. My kids’ bedtime became fluid when we were busy catching lightning bugs or watching The Parent Trap (for the 18th time). My work schedule wasn’t necessarily specific days and The post Post-summer reset: How to rebuild routines without overwhelming yourself appeared first on RescueTime Blog. View the full article

In the wake of my recent (and inaugural) visit to Disneyland, I read Richard Snow’s history of the park, Disney’s Land. Early in the book, Snow tells a story that I hadn’t heard before. It fascinated me—not just for its details, but also, as I’ll soon elaborate, for its potential relevance to our current moment. The tale begins in 1948. According to Snow, Disney’s personal nurse and informal confidant, Hazel George, had become worried. “[She] began to sense that her boss was sinking into what seemed to her to be a dangerous depression,” Snow writes. “Perhaps even heading toward what was then called a nervous breakdown.” The sources of this distress were obvious. Disney’s studio hadn’t had a hit since Bambi’s release in 1942, and the loss of the European markets during the war, as well as the economic uncertainty that followed in peacetime, had strained the company’s finances. Meanwhile, during this same period, Disney faced an animator strike that he took as a personal betrayal. “It seemed again to just be pound, pound, pound,” writes Snow. “Disney was often aggressive, abrupt, and when not angry, remote.” Hazel George, however, had a solution. She knew about Disney’s childhood fascination with steam trains, so it caught her attention when she saw an advertisement in the paper for the Chicago Railroad Fair, which would feature exhibits from thirty different railway lines built out over fifty acres on the shore of Lake Michigan. She suggested Disney take a vacation to see the fair. He loved the idea. In Chicago, entranced by what he encountered, Disney felt a spark of the creative enthusiasm that had been missing throughout the war years. He just needed to find a way to harness it. Serendipitously, upon returning to Los Angeles, one of his animators, Ward Kimball, introduced him to a group of West Coast train enthusiasts who were building scale models of functioning steam trains large enough for an adult to ride on (think: cars roughly the length of a child’s wagon). This, Disney decided, is what he needed to do. In 1949, Disney and his wife, Lillian, bought a five-acre plot of land on Carolwood Drive in the Holmby Hills neighborhood of LA, to build a new house. They chose the location in large part because Disney thought its layout would be perfect for his own scale railroad project. Over the next year, he worked with the machine shops at his studio to help construct his scale trains and with a team of landscapers to build out the track and its surroundings. When complete, Disney’s Carolwood Pacific Railroad, as he called it, included a half-mile of right-of- way that circled the house and yard, including a 46-foot-long trestle bridge and a 90-foot-long tunnel dug under his wife’s flower bed—complete with an S-turn shape so that you couldn’t see the other end upon entering. His rolling stock included his 1:8 scale steam locomotive, called the Lilly Belle, six cast-metal gondolas, two boxcars, two stock cars, a flatcar, and a wooden caboose decorated inside with miniature details like a twig-sized broom and tiny potbelly stove that could actually be lit. As Snow tells it, this project re-energized Disney. The more he worked on the line, the more ideas began to flow for his company. Soon, one such idea began to dominate all the others. In 1953, Disney abruptly shut down the Carolwood Pacific. It had accomplished its goal of helping him rediscover his creative inspiration, but now he had a bigger project to pursue; one that would dominate the final chapter of his career and provide him endless fascination and enthusiasm: he would build a theme park. As Snow concludes: “Of all the influences that helped shape Disneyland, the railroad is the seminal one. Or, rather, a railroad. One Disney owned.” ~~~ My term for what Disney achieved in building the Carolwood Pacific Railroad is engineered wonder. More generally, engineered wonder is when you take something that sparks a genuine flare of interest, and you pursue it to a degree that’s remarkable (or, depending on who you ask, perhaps even absurd). Such projects are not done for money, or advancement, or respect, but instead just because they fascinate you, and you want to amplify that feeling as expansively as possible. This brings me back to my promised connection to our current moment. In the early 1950s, Disney deployed engineered wonder to escape the creativity-sapping economic doldrums created by wartime uncertainty. Seventy-five years later, I see a more widely relevant use for this strategy: escaping the digital doldrums created by mediating too many of our experiences through screens. I increasingly worry that as we live more and more of both our personal and professional lives in the undifferentiated abstraction of the digital, we lose touch with what it’s like to grapple with the joys and difficulties of the real world: to feel real awe, or curiosity, or fascination, and not just an algorithmically-optimized burst of emotion; to see our intentions manifest concretely in the world, and not just mechanically measured by view counts and likes. Engineered wonder offers an escape from this state. It reawakens our nervous systems to what it’s like to engage with the non-digital. It teaches our brains to crave the real sensations and reactions that our screens can only simulate. It’s a way to jumpstart a more exciting chapter in our lives. During Disney’s era, the Carolwood Pacific Project likely seemed extreme to most people he encountered. Today, this extremeness might be exactly what we need. The post On Engineered Wonder appeared first on Cal Newport. View the full article

5-second summary Research shows that weather impacts mood, focus, and energy. Seasonal Affective Disorder and disrupted circadian rhythms reduce winter productivity, while summer sun boosts mood but offers distractions. Mindset matters: People with a positive view of winter stay more engaged. Studies from Harvard Business School show people are more focused on rainy days, and that time of day and weather conditions affect ethical decision-making and performance. Tips: Adapt workspaces and schedules to match the season, such as cozy, light-filled spaces in winter and flexible hours with outdoor breaks in summer to support different personality types. Subscribe to Work LifeGet stories like this in your inbox Subscribe Not all productivity challenges are personal – some are seasonal. Whether you thrive in winter’s quiet or feed off summer’s energy, syncing your workflow with the weather might be the performance hack you need. Let’s unpack how seasonal shifts in light, temperature, and perspective shape how we work – and what individuals and organizations can do to adapt. The psychology behind seasonal productivity Seasonal shifts don’t just change how we feel – they influence how our brains work. Changes in light and temperature impact everything from serotonin levels to sleep cycles, affecting mood, motivation, and mental clarity in ways that affect our ability to get things done. Light, serotonin, and focus Our exposure to sunlight influences serotonin levels, which play a key role in mood and motivation. In the darker months, lower serotonin and disrupted sleep cycles can lead to fatigue and brain fog, causing people to feel sluggish or unmotivated in winter. Temperature and energy Temperature also plays a significant role in our energy levels. Cold weather can discourage physical activity (not to mention commuting), while high heat can cause dehydration and mental fatigue. “Cold weather can lead to sluggishness, while heat may cause fatigue and dehydration. Rainy days can increase focus, as fewer outdoor distractions exist. These seasonal fluctuations affect physical and mental productivity, as energy levels can dip in the winter and peak in the summer,” says Debra Wein, CEO of Wellness Workdays, a leading provider of measurable workplace wellness programs that help organizations improve employee health, well-being, and productivity. Seasonal Affective Disorder For some, these shifts stem from Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD), a form of depression triggered by reduced sunlight. SAD can bring on low mood, poor concentration, and withdrawal from activities. “Shorter daylight hours impact serotonin and energy regulation,” explains clinical psychologist Dr. Kelly Rohan on the APA’s Speaking of Psychology podcast. “This often results in lower motivation and focus during the winter months.” Dr. Rohan developed a specialized treatment called Cognitive Behavioral Therapy for SAD (CBT-SAD), which targets negative expectations about winter and helps people reframe the season as one that allows for rest, reflection, and different types of productivity. Similarly, as psychologist Dr. Kari Leibowitz explains in her book How to Winter, people who adopted a “positive winter mindset,” particularly in places with long, dark winters like Svalbard, Norway, reported greater emotional well-being and life satisfaction. Rather than resisting the season, they embraced it as an opportunity for calm and focus. A mental shift in how we approach seasonal challenges can reframe winter as a time for focus and renewal rather than burnout. *Note: We’re not mental health professionals. For struggles with SAD, consult a licensed clinician. How personality types respond to seasons Related Article Night owl or early bird? Discover your circadian personality By Tracy Middleton In Productivity The seasons impact more than the weather–they shift how we feel, think, and work. As daylight, temperature, and energy levels fluctuate, so does productivity. For some, winter offers an environment for focus. For others, summer’s longer and sunny days spark motivation. Winter thrivers: quiet season, big results Introverts often find winter a natural match for their working style. With fewer social engagements, quieter surroundings, and permission to slow down, winter can create the ideal environment for deep, focused work. According to The HR Agency, introverts excel at tasks requiring deep concentration and thoughtful decision-making – conditions that winter naturally supports by reducing overstimulation and social pressure. “Introverts tend to thrive in calmer, more solitary settings,” says Wein. “Tasks that require deep thinking or strategic planning often get done more effectively in the winter.” Wein adds that cozy home offices, warm lighting, and reduced social obligations allow introverts to recharge and produce their best work. Summer thrivers: why the warmer months can be energizing Extroverts, on the other hand, may come alive in summer. Longer days, outdoor opportunities, and more social interaction energize them. The collaborative nature of summer’s social events can inspire new ideas and fuel creativity. “People want to be outside, and that can be distracting – or energizing – depending on your personality,” says Wein. Outdoor team-building, casual brainstorming sessions, or even walking meetings can help extroverts stay engaged and productive. How to manage seasonal slumps A few smart adjustments can go a long way, whether you’re managing a team or your own productivity. For organizations Companies can improve productivity by aligning policies with seasonal needs. In winter, this might mean offering remote options or staggered hours, curating well-lit, comfortable spaces, or promoting movement through gym stipends or mid-day breaks. In summer, embrace the season’s natural energy by scheduling outdoor meetings, offering flexible hours like “summer Fridays.” According to ABL Recruitment, companies that formatted their workflow around seasonal energy patterns saw up to a 15% increase in overall output. This included scheduling data-heavy, analytical tasks like reporting, budgeting, or long-term planning in the winter months and reserving collaborative, creative initiatives for the summer when employees are often more energetic. For individuals Small changes can help you work with the season. In winter, light therapy, movement breaks, and cozy workspaces can help fight off sluggishness. In summer, block focus time early in the day, take short outdoor breaks to recharge, and stay hydrated. Weather and seasonal changes influence energy, focus, and productivity. Adapting workspaces, schedules, and expectations to align with seasonal conditions – and recognizing when different personality types thrive – can help individuals and teams stay productive all year round. Subscribe to Work LifeGet stories like this in your inbox Subscribe The post The science of seasonal productivity appeared first on Work Life by Atlassian. View the full article

When it comes to team size, bigger isn’t always better. According to a study from ThinkWise, 52% of executives at small businesses believe their team is achieving its potential, compared to just 35% of those at mid-sized organizations and 39% of large-sized companies. Once a team includes more than 50 people, 86% of executives believe The post 6 ways shared team dashboards help large teams perform like small ones appeared first on RescueTime Blog. View the full article