100X Filmmaking with The Devastating Power of Focus

I saw my results improve dramatically when I started incorporating the simple actions I’m about to share into my daily routine.

Within one year, I won a film festival, left my 9-5 job as my content creation education business took off, and met my girlfriend.

Vouchercloud, a UK-based company, just published the results of a survey of 1,989 full-time office workers in the UK. The survey was part of research into workers' online habits and productivity.

They found that ‘2 hours and 53 minutes’ of actual productivity occurred on average across all respondents.

I’ve heard multiple very successful filmmakers and business leaders say that adding just four solid hours of deep work per day was the key to their results.

So, my goal became to have 4-6 hours of genuine, focused, deep work.

Time should be valued as the highest-value currency.

Time is the one thing we can never get back, we can never make more of…

So today, I will share how you can harness the devastating power of focus.

The Proven System to Accelerate Growth & Build a Life of Freedom

Deep, prolonged focus is essential for developing a high skill level and understanding in any discipline.

When you practice your subject, you physically alter your brain, making new connections, and the subject becomes part of you, an instinct.

The more deeply you can absorb yourself in a topic, the faster and easier it will be to create this physical transformation of your brain. 

It's extremely easy in our modern world to be unbelievably distracted.

Social media is the most advanced AI, specifically designed to keep you distracted and spending as much time as possible on its platforms.

And that's just one of many elements of our world fighting for your focus. 

The upside is that while most of the world is distracted, you can have unbelievable focus compared to the masses. Because of that, you will win by default. 

Before we can implement this system, we must learn why it works so well. When you learn this, you will be highly motivated to make some changes in your life.

Stage 1 vs. Stage 2 thinking

According to a University of California Irvine study, “it takes an average of 23 minutes and 15 seconds to get back to the task every time you get a notification.”

Stage 1 thinking

Stage 1 thinking is when your brain is getting up to speed and getting clear on what is happening. It takes about 23 minutes for your brain to reach cruising altitude and reach Stage 2.

Stage 2 thinking

Stage 2 is when all engines are firing at full blast.

This is known as the "flow state," where you are in the zone and doing your best, most genius work.

Every time you get distracted, it's like hitting a reset button, putting your brain back on the launch pad.

If you want to stay focused, you must go through another 23-minute take-off sequence.

Every time you get distracted, it's like being back on the ground.

In stage one, we’re just not doing anything useful and we probably have 30 IQ points less in stage 1.

So we want as much time in stage 2.

I could never reach stage 2 and maintain it because I was constantly looking for distractions and happily letting them into my life.

Mainly scrolling social media, news, chatting with friends and team members.

And also I was letting other people steal it from me.

Letting people call and texting me, DM me etc. when I should be doing work.

We have responsibilities, and we have to be good family members and friends…

But we can do that later when we’re not working.

To take control of our lives, we must make a dedicated time of the day when we commit to our work and do not check notifications.

We must create a block of time in the day when no one can contact us.

And there are no emergencies.

If someone is dying, they will call 911.

The real emergency is protecting your time, the only thing you can never get back.

Once we control a portion of the day to get into deep work on achieving our goals, we can create the life we want.

Dopamine Detox

Technically, you can’t lower your dopamine levels. This is wellness culture nonsense.

But the point of this trend is this:

To not to reinforce addiction to social media and anything else that does not align with our goals.

Where addictions come from

Human beings evolved as effective hunters, tracking animals over days.

Each broken branch or clue engages our brain's reward system, releasing dopamine to keep us motivated and focused.

Today, basic necessities are abundant, and we can receive immediate feedback from social media or quick dopamine hits from substances like alcohol.

This creates a constant stream of dopamine rewards, making real work feel hard and unrewarding.

In a pre-modern or post-apocalyptic society, people who are now seen as alcoholics and drug addicts might have been our leaders or extremely effective members of society, as their behaviors aligned with the slow, sustained rewards our brains evolved to seek.

Our brains are wired to crave dopamine, whether from drugs or social media. By reducing these easy dopamine sources, mundane tasks start to feel rewarding.

For instance, I avoid looking at my phone during lunch or breaks, choosing instead to think or even stare at a wall. As insane as it might sound, this makes me excited to get back to work, as that becomes my next source of dopamine.

The dark side of social media

Max Fisher, a prominent journalist and author of “The Chaos Machine: The Inside Story of How Social Media Rewired Our Minds and Our World, argues that social media platforms use sophisticated AI algorithms designed to maximize user engagement by exploiting psychological vulnerabilities.

These algorithms prioritize content that triggers strong emotional responses, such as outrage, fear, and pleasure, because these emotions keep users engaged longer and returning more frequently.

So, not only are we easily addicted to social media, but social media is also the most advanced AI designed to keep us distracted.

Even drugs can’t do that.

How to Install The Devastating Power of Focus in Your Life Today

Step 1: Remove Notifications

1. Go to your phone’s settings, find the notifications, and turn them ALL off.

   
   I turn off notifications for every app—the main one is to turn off notifications for texts and social media.

Now, YOU control when you check your phone.

Instead of everyone else sucking away your time, your life, and your soul.

Do you want to know how addicted you are to your phone?

Lock your phone in the garage for seven days.

Then, see how you feel.

Most people, including myself, have felt they were missing an arm.

Reminds me of drugs.

Step 2: Delete Social media from your phone.

I access social media from my computer. This helps me use it only for business or to learn something new.

I only follow close friends, family, and people in my field of interest who have achieved greater results than I have.

Social media is a powerful way to acquire new knowledge and ways of thinking, but we must minimize the potential for distraction.

Remember, the social media machine is built to keep you mindlessly scrolling, so build protections from that.

Use social media, don’t get used by it.

Step 3: Remove distractions online

When I search for something on YouTube, I’m amazed that AI can find content that will distract and present it to me. YouTube's home screen is incredible at capturing attention.

Don’t let it.

You can get a plug-in for Chrome, Safari, or probably any browser that will hide all the distractions on YouTube.

It will also hide the feed on Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, LinkedIn, etc. if you want it to.

So, another benefit of using social media on the browser is that you can have more control over its use.

You can look up “Newsfeed Eradicator” for Chrome and the “Burnfeed App” for Safari.

Put In The Work

To be successful at something, you have to be consistent and relentless, and that's why it's essential to be passionate about the overall thing that's being done.

But passion isn’t enough. It would help if you focused that energy into a laser beam on your goals.

If you implement these strategies, you could work a 4-hour workday and be working an average person’s 10-hour day.

This is how you can stop spinning your wheels, start making progress, and simultaneously have more space for living life.

So let’s get to work.

Your biggest fan,

Dan