It seems like paying attention should be easy. Yet for many of us, it has become one of the hardest things to do. We start reading an article and suddenly we’re checking email. We pick up our phone to do one thing and, twenty minutes later, we’ve forgotten why we picked it up in the first place. We often blame ourselves for lacking discipline, but what if that’s only part of the story? Is our ability to focus actually being stolen—and if so, by whom?
Journalist and bestselling author Johann Hari set out to answer those questions by traveling the world and interviewing many of the leading scientists and experts studying attention, distraction, and the brain. What he discovered challenges many of the assumptions we have about why it’s become so difficult to concentrate and why simply trying harder isn’t enough.
In this fascinating conversation, Johann explains what’s really happening to our attention, why deep focus matters so much for creativity, productivity, happiness, and relationships, and what all of us can do to reclaim it. If you’ve ever felt overwhelmed by distractions or wondered why staying focused seems harder than it used to, you’ll find this discussion both eye-opening and surprisingly hopeful.
Johann Hari is the author of Stolen Focus: Why You Can’t Pay Attention—And How to Think Deeply Again (https://amzn.to/3Mfsp12).
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RESOURCES FOR THIS EPISODE:
Amazon link for Johann Hari’s book, Stolen Focus: https://amzn.to/4ggfa06
