Is your brain absolutely cooked after a weekend of slogging through Black Friday emails, online shopping, and doomscrolling? Are your neurons on fire and crying out for water?

I’m going to show you a strategy I learned from Tim Ferriss over 15 years ago, one that will quickly bring blessed silence to your addled brain.

But first, I want to talk about what all those emails and social ads are doing to our already-fragmented attentional capacities.

Black Friday

I woke up after a rough night digesting one of the largest meals I’ve eaten in my entire life. I got up, meditated, and then made a pot of coffee to cut through the brain fog.

Then, I made the mistake of checking Gmail on my phone.

Before long, I was sucked into reading emails from all my favorite online gurus and creators. What can I say? I’m a sucker for good sales copy. I love learning, and I’m low-key addicted to online courses, especially in the realms of spirituality, personal growth, writing, and online business. Before long, I was chasing dopamine down multiple online rabbit holes at the same time. Fun, right?

The problem is, checking email first thing in the morning ruins your ability to focus throughout the day.

There is neuroscience research showing that it takes an average of 23 minutes to re-establish focus after even a brief interruption. That means every time you check your phone, you are starting over again at square one. Considering most people check their phones 96 times per day, that means we’re spending our days in a constant haze of distraction and never achieving true cognitive focus on our most important tasks and projects.

Not only that, but taking in information tends to create ‘open loops.’

Every time you read a Substack article or listen to a podcast, you probably have thoughts like, “I should really ____” (start journaling, learn the jhanas, read the classics, watch KPop Demon Hunters, etc). All these open loops tend to come up in your mind as distractions later on when you’re trying to work, meditate, or spend time with your family. This goes double when you get exposed to other people’s marketing messages, which are designed to create open loops that only get closed when you buy something.

Now, in general I am a pretty mindful guy.

I don’t have any social media apps or games on my phone, and as a result, I’ve kept my screen time to around 90 minutes per day for the past few years. But lately, I’ve noticed myself scrolling Reddit more (the thinking man’s social media platform) and listening to podcasts every spare minute in the car or at the gym. Worst of all, I’m taking in so much information that I feel like it’s making me less present with my wife.

And so, my mind turned to a solution that I haven’t dared to put into practice in years—the nuclear option of anti-distraction strategies— one that I know is brutally effective at cutting my mental signal-to-noise ratio.

Enter the Low-Information Diet.

Tim Ferriss first shared this protocol in the 2007 bestseller that made him famous: The Four Hour Workweek.

The ‘Diet’ is simple:

• Don’t check email until 12 PM. Tim recommends checking and responding to email just once or twice per day (12 & 4) if you can, and using an autoresponder if you need to.

• An immediate one-week media fast, consisting of:

• No more than 1 hour of TV and 1 hour of reading (ideally fiction or poetry, not nonfiction) before bed.

• No news, social media, internet surfing, doomscrolling, podcasts, chatting with your AI girlfriend, or other information intake unless it’s strictly necessary for your next action at work.

• Music is allowed at all times.

I am implementing the LID and media fast starting this morning. If you want to do the one-week fast along with me, reply below to let me know you’re in. Maybe I’ll even start a group chat for mutual emotional support.

For accountability’s sake, here’s my screen time data for the past two weeks:

• Last week: Average time on phone: 2:56 per day (up 50% from previous week, due to Thanksgiving/Black Friday weekend and re-downloading the Substack app). Average pickups per day: 53.

• Previous week: (closer to normal for me): 1:54 per day with 54 pickups.

I’ve already re-deleted the Substack app and turned off notifications for everything except Messages. Hopefully by next week I’ll be able to report that those numbers are down significantly. And if you join me, you will too.

Here’s wishing you a week of delicious mental peace and quiet,

Chris Cordry, LMFT

PS:

If you’d like personal guidance on eliminating distractions and making room for big changes in your life in the New Year, I have a new offer for you. I am opening up two individual coaching spots for Q1 next year. This is a 12 week coaching container specifically for people who want to start the year with clarity and make serious progress toward your most important goals. I will bring all my best tools to help you make the changes you want, from personalized guided meditations to deep parts work with Core Transformation. Interested? Reply to this email with ‘coaching’ and we’ll set up a free 20-minute call to see if it’s a good fit.