Unplugging with Intention: Scheduled Notification Breaks
Plus, some tools and news items you may have missed.
Happy Labor Day. I hope you enjoy a well-deserved day off and take advantage of one extra day to get your things in order.
I wrote about Parkinson’s Law and Time Management last week; if you missed that, here you go.
👋🏻 A big, warm welcome to all the new subscribers. Seriously, I’m glad you're here.
Let’s Dig In ⛏️
In our insane, fast-paced digital world, notifications constantly disrupt our focus. To regain control and enhance productivity, consider Scheduled Notification Breaks.
Benefits:
Boosted Focus: Unplugging during tasks improves concentration and productivity.
Reduced Stress: Notification breaks create mental breathing room and balance.
Enhanced Creativity: Deep focus encourages innovative thinking.
My Strategy:
Dedicated No Notification Times: Silence notifications during specific hours for focused work.
I recommend using something already in your pocket: Focus Modes on iPhone. Introduced in iOS 15, Focus modes allow you to set separate configurations based on time, day, or location for apps, icons, and home screens.
I do not use the geolocation feature, where you can set different focus modes based on location, but that’s still awesome.
My focus modes:
❌ DND - Do Not Disturb (10:00 pm-5:30 am daily)
No one can reach me, and no apps can inject notifications into my brain. I use this during kids’ doctor appointments, important meetings, or when I just can’t.
Personal-centered home screen, filled with personal-related widgets active.
😎 Personal (5:30 am-9:30 am and 5:30 pm-9:59 pm daily)
My VIPs can contact me, and the apps I don’t mind hearing from can send notifications.
Personal-centered home screen, filled with personal-related widgets active.
💻️ Work (9:30 am-5:30 pm weekdays)
VIPs and work folks can contact me with work-related apps allowed to send notifications.
Work-centered home screen, filled with work-related widgets active.
💤 Sleep (10:00 pm-5:30 am daily)
Family can contact me; no apps are allowed to send notifications.
Sleep home screen active, just a clock, a sleep app, and the weather.
🌿 Weekend/Vacation (12:00 am-11:59 pm weekends or the whole time on vacation)
Same setup as personal
☝🏻 Remember, every ping and buzz will chip away at your inner peace. Challenge yourself to step back, reclaim your time, and reset your relationship with your devices. You can transform from constant reactivity to mindfulness and serenity by taking control. Begin today and unveil the calmest, least-stressed version of yourself. Because life's best moments often aren't captured in pixels but in present memories. 🌼🍃
Tools I use that you should try 🔧
Are you an Olympic-level copy-and-paste champion like me? If so, you’ll love this. This will rock your socks if you’ve never used a clipboard manager.
Need to trim some audio or video, compress or edit a PDF, or convert a giant WAV file into a more manageable MP3? Do it all here, and be sure to bookmark it.
Have you ever had a song pop up on Spotify via the slick algorithm, which sounded fantastic, but you had to CMD+TAB your way back to Spotify? NO MORE. This will keep a small window of what’s playing so you can see what you are listening to with a gentle glance.
Music 🎧️
The Grey - Tesseract
ICYMI News 📰
Remember when advertisers were freaking out about being unable to target as effectively in the future? It turns out Gen Z doesn't care. - Marketing Dive
I'm deeply passionate about music data, and I cannot emphasize enough its immense potential and value. Tero Potila of TeroPotila.com does a fantastic job of breaking down the basics here. - Hypebot
On the topic of tools, Zapier has just unveiled a list of the top 35 digital marketing tools for 2023. I've incorporated many of these into my arsenal, though not all. How about we explore them together and share our insights? - Zapier
Podcasts and streaming overtook traditional radio and stuff like Pandora and SiriusXM in popularity. That's according to the latest Edison Weekly Insights. - Edison Research
Are you tinkering with AI voice generators yet? If not, try the new Eleven Labs release; it's pretty good. - Eleven Labs