07/18/2026
๐๐จ๐ฎ ๐ฐ๐ข๐ฅ๐ฅ ๐ง๐๐ฏ๐๐ซ ๐๐ง๐ญ๐๐ซ ๐๐๐๐ฉ ๐ฐ๐จ๐ซ๐ค ๐ฐ๐ข๐ญ๐ก ๐ง๐จ๐ญ๐ข๐๐ข๐๐๐ญ๐ข๐จ๐ง๐ฌ ๐จ๐ง (๐ก๐๐ซ๐'๐ฌ ๐ฉ๐ซ๐จ๐จ๐)
My friends think I'm rude. I don't answer calls. I keep deactivating my social media.
None of my apps have notifications โ no ringtone, no banners. Just two alarms: bedtime and wake time.
Here's why.
Working as a digital marketer for years, I know how platforms monetize every second you stay, and I know their algorithm has studied you longer and closer than your spouse has.
Politics that make your blood boil.
Showbiz gossip you swore you didn't care about.
Memes calibrated to your exact sense of humor.
None of that is an accident. Someone put it there.
Then I found the math.
Dr. Gloria Mark at UC Irvine tracked office workers and found it takes 23 minutes to fully return to a task after an interruption.
Her same research found we switch attention every 3 minutes.
Did you see the problem there?
Interrupted every 3 minutes. 23 minutes to recover.
It means, you never recover. You never enter deep work. Not once. All day.
"But Quin, don't you miss things?"
Yes. I miss the news. I miss whatever everyone was arguing about last Tuesday.
But I'd rather miss the news than miss my ambitions.
And emergencies? If something actually matters to me, it finds me. The people who matter have my phone number.
Thatโs the whole trade โ my attention goes to the work and the people who deserve it. Everything else can wait or it can leave.
If you're struggling to focus, start with one change: kill your notifications. Phone and email both. Put the phone where you can't see it.
The noise stops. The clarity comes back.
Someone is always going to pull the string. The only move is to not be attached to it.
