First and foremost, my deepest thanks to my business and life partner, Julie Li. Her contributions to this project are beyond measure. Julie allowed me to share intimate stories about our marriage, was there to help me test ideas and tactics, and spent countless hours improving this book. We’ve walked this path together every step of the way, and she is my motivation and inspiration for being a better man.
Next, thank you to Jasmine, my daughter, who not only provided the inspiration to become indistractable but (in her ten-year-old way) was also enthusiastically helpful with the naming, cover design, and marketing of the book.
And, of course, my parents, Ronit and Victor, and in-laws, Anne and Paul, for their encouragement. Their support and enthusiasm for every one of my crazy projects means so much to me.
Thank you to the brave people who read very early (and very rough) drafts of this book. Thank you to Eric Barker, Caitlin Bauer, Gaia Bernstein, Jonathan Bolden, Cara Cannella, Linda Cyr, Geraldine DeRuiter, Kyle Eschenroeder, Monique Eyal, Omer Eyal, Rand Fishkin, Jose Hamilton, Wes Kao, Josh Kaufman, Carey Kolaja, Carl Marci, Jason Ogle, Ross Overline, Taylor Pearson, Jillian Richardson, Alexandra Samuel, Oren Shapira, Vikas Singhal, Shane Snow, Charles Wang, and Andrew Zimmermann. Reading an early manuscript is hard work, and I can’t thank you enough for your thoughtful comments and insights.
Thank you to Christy Fletcher and her team for top-notch representation. Christy is a terrific agent, and I owe her loads of thanks for her counsel and friendship. Thank you to Melissa Chinchillo, Grainne Fox, Sarah Fuentes, Veronica Goldstein, Elizabeth Resnick, and Alyssa Taylor at Fletcher & Co.
I’d also like to thank Stacy Creamer at Audible, as well as the team at BenBella, including Sarah Avinger, Heather Butterfield, Jennifer Canzoneri, Lise Engel, Stephanie Gorton, Aida Herrera, Alicia Kania, Adrienne Lang, Monica Lowry, Vy Tran, Susan Welte, Leah Wilson, and Glenn Yeffeth, for their efforts bringing this book to market.
Alexis Kirschbaum at Bloomsbury went above and beyond what any author could ask for in an editor and played a critical hand in improving this book. She and her colleagues, including Hermione Davis, Thi Dinh, Genevieve Nelsson, Andy Palmer, Genista Tate-Alexander, and Angelique Tran Van Sang, deserve my sincere gratitude.
Thanks to the following people for their help researching, editing, and refining Indistractable: Karen Beattie, Matthew Gartland, Jonah Lehrer, Janna Marlies Maron, Mickayla Mazutinec, Paulette Perhach, Chelsea Robertson, Ray Sylvester, and AnneMarie Ward.
Particular thanks to Thomas Kjemperud and Andrea Schumann for their assistance running NirAndFar.com. Thank you also to Carla Cruttenden, Damon Nofar, and Brett Red for the graphics in this book, and to Rafael Arizaga Vaca for helping with more projects than I can count. I can’t thank these wonderful people enough!
Then there are the following people I want to thank for providing moral and intellectual support: Arianna Huffington, for her enthusiasm for this project; Mark Manson, Taylor Pearson, and Steve Kamb, for being consistent coworking buddies and for helping me stay focused while writing this book; Adam Gazzaley, for generously providing the Indistractable.com domain; and James Clear, Ryan Holiday, David Kadavy, Fernanda Neute, Shane Parrish, Kim Raices, Gretchen Rubin, Tim Urban, Vanessa Van Edwards, Alexandra Watkins, and Ryan Williams for sharing insights and giving great advice.
I have no doubt neglected to include some very important people. Along with forgiveness, I ask to invoke Hanlon’s razor, “Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity.” I’m sorry and thank you!
Finally, and most important, thank you, the reader. Spending your precious time and attention with this book means the world to me. Feel free to contact me if I can be helpful at NirAndFar.com/Contact.
Contributors
Thank you to the loyal blog subscribers named below for their help crowd-editing Indistractable. Their insights, suggestions, and encouragement were immensely important in making this book what it is.
Reed Abbott
Shira Abel
Zalman Abraham
Eveline van Acquoij
Daniel Adeyemi
Patrick Adiaheno
Sachin Agarwal
Avneep Aggarwal
Vineet Aggarwal
Abhishek Kumar Agrahari
Neetu Agrawal
Sonali Agrawal
Syed Ahmed
Matteus Åkesson
Stephen Akomolafe
Alessandra Albano
Chrissy Allan
Patricia De Almeida
Hagit Alon
Bos Alvertos
Erica Amalfitano
Mateus Gundlach Ambros
Iuliia Ankudynova
Tarkan Anlar
Lauren Antonoff
Jeremi Walewicz Antonowicz
Kavita Appachu
Yasmin Aristizabal
Lara Ashmore
Aby Atilola
Jeanne Audino
Jennifer Ayers
Marcelo Schenk de Azambuja
Xavier Baars
Deepinder Singh Babbar
Rupert Bacon
Shampa Bagchi
Warren Baker
Tamar Balkin
Giacomo Barbieri
Surendra Bashani
Asya Bashina
Omri Baumer
Jeff Beckmen
Walid Belballi
Jonathan Bennun
Muna Benthami
Gael Bergeron
Abhishek Bhardwaj
Kunal Bhatia
Marc Biemer
Olia Birulia
Nancy Black
Eden Blackwell
Charlotte Blank
Kelli Blum
Rachel Bodnar
Stephan Borg
Mia Bourgeois
Charles Brewer
Sam Brinson
Michele Brown
Ryan Brown
Jesse Brown
Sarah E. Brown
Michelle E. Brownstein
John Bryan
Renée Buchanan
Scott Bundgaard
Steve Burnel
Michael Burroughs
Tamar Burton
Jessica Cameron
Jerome Cance
Jim Canterucci
Ryan Capple
Savannah Carlin
James Carman
Karla H. Carpenter
Margarida Carvalho
Anthony Catanese
Shubha Chakravarthy
Karthy Chandra
Joseph Chang
Jay Chaplin
David Chau
Janet Y. Chen
Ari Cheskes
Dennis Chirwa
Kristina Yuh-Wen Chou
Ingrid Choy-Harris
William Chu
Michelle M. Chu
Jay Chung
Matthew Cinelli
Sergiu Vlad Ciurescu
Trevor Claiborne
Kay Krystal Clopton
Heather Cloward
Lilia M. Coburn
Pip Cody
Michele Helene Cohen
Luis Colin
Abi Collins
Kerry Cooper
Dave Cooper
Simon Coxon
Carla Cruttenden
Dmitrii Cucleschin
Patrick Cullen
Leo Cunningham
Gennaro Cuofano
Ed Cutshaw
Larry Czerwonka
Lloyd D’Silva
Jonathan Dadone
Sharon F. Danzger
Kyle Huff David
Lulu Davies
James Davis Jr.
Joel Davis
Stephen Delaney
Keval D. Desai
Ankit S. Dhingra
Manuel Dianese
Jorge Dieguez
Lisa Hendry Dillon
Sam Dix
Lindsay Donaire
Ingrid Elise Dorai-Rekaa
Tom Droste
Nan Duangnapa
Scott Dunlap
Akhilesh Reddy Dwarampudi
Swapnil Dwivedi
Daniel Edman
Anders Eidergard
Dudi Einey
Max Elander
Ori Elisar
Katie Elliott
Gary Engel
David Ensor
Eszter Erdelyi
Ozge Ergen
Bec Evans
David Evans
Shirley Evans
Jeff Evernham
Kimberly Fandino
Kathlyn Farrell
Hannah Farrow
Michael Ferguson
Nissanka Fernando
Margaret Fero
Kyra Fillmore
Yegor Filonov
Fabian Fischer
Jai Flicker
Collin Flotta
Michael Flynn
Kaleigh Flynn
Gio Focaraccio
Ivan Foong
Michael A. Foster II
Martin Foster
Jonathan Freedman
Heather Friedland
Janine Fusco
Pooja V. Gaikwad
Mario Alberto Galindo
Mary Gallotta
Zander Galloway
Sandra Gannon
Angelica Garcia
Anyssa Sebia Garza
Allegra Gee
Tom Gilheany
Raji Gill
Scott Gillespie
Scott Gilly
Wendell Gingerich
Kevin Glynn
Paula Godar
Jeroen Goddijn
Anthony Gold
Dan Goldman
Miguel H. Gonzalez
Sandra Catalina González
Vijay Gopalakrishnan
Herve Le Gouguec
Nicholas Gracilla
Charlie Graham
Timothy L. Graham
Shawn Green
Chris Greene
Jennifer Griffin
Dani Grodsky
Rebecca Groner
Saksham Grover
Alcide Guillory III
Roberta Guise
Anjana Gummadivalli
Matt Gummow
Amit Gupta
John Haggerty
Martin Haiek
Lance Haley
Thomas Hallgren
Eric Hamilton
Caroline Hane-Weijman
Nickie Harber-Frankart
Julie Harris
Sophie Hart
Daniel Hegman
Christopher Heiser
Lisa Helminiak
Alecia Helton
Mauricio Hess-Flores
Holly Hester-Reilly
Andrea Hill
Neeraj Hirani
Isabella Catarina Hirt
Charlotte Jane Ho
Ian Hoch
Travis Hodges
Jason Hoenich
Alex J. Holte
Abi Hough
Mary Howland
Evan Huggins
Nathan Hull
Novianta L. T. Hutagalung
Marc Inzelstein
Varun Iyer
Britni Jackson
Mahaveer Jain
Abdellah Janid
Anne Janzer
Emilio Jéldrez
Debbie Jenkins
Alexandre Jeong
Amy M. Jones
Daniela Jones
Peter Jotanovic
Cindy Joung
Sarah Jukes
Steve Jungmann
Rocel Ann Junio
Kevin Just
Ahsan Kabir
Ariel Kahan
Sina Kahen
Sarah Kajani
Shaheen Karodia
Irene Jena Karthik
Melissa Kaufmann
Gagandeep Kaur
Megan Keane
J. Bavani Kehoe
Karen Kelvie
Erik Kemper
Raye Keslensky
Jenny Shaw Kessler
Jeremy C. Kester
Kirk Ketefian
Nathan Khakshouri
Sarah Khalid
Sam Kirk
Rachel Kirton
Vinod Kizhakke
Samuel Koch
Alaina Koerber
Sai Prabhu Konchada
Jason Koprowski
Basavaraj Koti
Yannis Koutavas
David Kozisek
Aditya Kshirsagar
Ezekiel Kuang
Craig Kulyk
Ram Kunda
Ravi Kurani
Chris Kurdziel
Dimitry Kushelevsky
John Kvasnic
Jonathan Lai
Michael J. Lally
Roy Lamphier
Craig Lancaster
Niklas Laninge
Simon Lapscher
Angelo Larocca
Norman Law
Olga Lefter
Tory Leggat
Ieva Lekaviciute
Audrey Leung
Viviana Leveghi
Isaac E. H. Lewis
Belly Li
Sammy Chen Li
Philip Li
Robert Liebert
Brendan Lim
Carissa Lintao
Ross Lloyd Lipschitz
Mitchell Lisle
Mike Sho Liu
Shelly Eisen Livneh
John Loftus
Philip K. Lohr
Sune Lomholt
Sean Long
Alexis Longinotti
Glen Lubbert
Ana Lugard
Kenda Macdonald
Boykie Mackay
Andy Maes
Kristof Maeyens
Lisa Maldonado
Amin Malik
Danielle Manello
Frank Manue Jr.
Dan Mark
Kendra Markle
Ben Marland
Rob Marois
Judy Marshall
Levi Mårten
Denise J. Martin
Megan Martin
Kristina Corzine Martinez
Saji Maruthurkkara
Laurent Mascherpa
Mark Mavroudis
Ronny Max
Eva A. May
Lisa McCormack
Gary McCue
Michael McGee
Robert McGovern
Lyle McKeany
Sarah McKee
Marisa McKently
Erik van Mechelen
Hoda Mehr
Jonathan Melhuish
Sheetal G. Melwani
Ketriel J. Mendy
Valerae Mercury
Andreia Mesquita
Johan Meyer
Kaustubh S. Mhatre
Stéphanie Michaux
Ivory Miller
Jason Ming
Al Ming
Jan Miofsky
Ahmed A. Mirza
Peter Mitchell
Mika Mitoko
Meliza Mitra
Subarna Mitra
Aditya Morarka
Amina Moreau
David Morgan
Renee F. Morris
Matthew Morrisson
Alexandra Moxin
Alex Moy
Brian Muldowney
Namrata Mundhra
Jake Munsey
Mihnea Munteanu
Kevin C. Murray
Serdar Muslu
Karan Naik
Isabelle Di Nallo
Jeroen Nas
Vaishakhi Nayar
Jordan Naylor
Christine Neff
Jamie Nelson
Kemar Newell
Lewis Kang’ethe Ngugi
Chi Gia Nguyen
Christopher Nheu
Gerard Nielsen
Adam Noall
Tim Noetzel
Jason Nokes
Craig Norman
Chris Novell
Thomas O’Duffy
Scott Oakes
Cheily Ochoa
Leon Odey-Knight
Kelechi Okorie
Oluwatobi Oladiran
Valary Oleinik
Sue Olsen
Alan Olson
Gwendolyn Olton
Maaike Ono-Boots
Brian Ostergaard
Roland Osvath
Renz Pacheco
Nina Pacifico
Sumit Pahwa
Girri M. Palaniyapan
Vishal Kumar Pallerla
Rohit Pant
Chris V. Papadimitriou
Nick Pape
Divya Parekh
Rich Paret
Alicia Park
Aaron Parker
Steve Parkinson
Mizue Parrott
Lomit Patel
Manish Patel
Swati Patil
Jon Pederson
Alon Peled
Rodaan Peralta-Rabang
Marco Perlman
Christina Diem Pham
Hung Phan
Ana Pischl
Keshav Pitani
Rose La Prairie
Indira Pranabudi
Anne Curi Preisig
Julie Price
Martin Pritchard
Rungsun Promprasith
Krzysztof Przybylski
Edmundas Pučkorius
Călin Pupăză
Daisy Qin
Lien Quach
Colin Raab
Kelly Ragle
Ruta Raju
Lalit Raju
Kim Ramirez
Prashanthi Ravanavarapu
Gustavo Razzetti
Omar Regalado
Scott W. Rencher
Brian Rensing
Joel Rigler
Michelle Riley
Gina Riley
Ioana Rill
Mark Rimkus
Cinzia Rinelli
Chelsea Lyn Robertson
Bridgitt Ann Robertson
Reigh Robitaille
Cynthia Rodriguez
Annette Rodriguez
Charles François Roels
Linda Rolf
Edgar Roman
Mathieu Romary
Jamie Rosen
Al Rosenberg
Joy Rosenstein
Christian Röß
Megan Rounds
Ruzanna Rozman
Isabel Russ
Mark Ruthman
Samantha Ryan
Alex Ryan
Kimberly Ryan
Jan Saarmann
Guy Saban
Victoria Sakal
Luis Saldana
Daniel Tarrago Salengue
Gabriel Michael Salim
Jessica Salisbury
Rick Salsa
Francesco Sanavio
Antonio J. Martinez Sanchez
Moses Sangobiyi
Julia Saxena
Stephanie Schiller
Lynnsey Schneider
Kirk Schueler
Katherine Schuetzner
Jon Seaton
Addy Suhairi Selamat
Vishal Shah
Shashi Sharma
Keshav Sharma
Ruchil Sharma
Ashley Sheinwald
Stephanie Sher
Jing Han Shiau
Claire Shields
Greg Shove
Karen Shue
Kome Sideso
David Marc Siegel
Dan Silberberg
Bianca Silva
Mindy Silva
Brian L. Silva
Zach Simon
Raymond Sims
Shiv Sivaguru
Malin Sjöstrand
Antoine Smets