{"id":30954,"date":"2021-03-31T10:49:05","date_gmt":"2021-03-31T14:49:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/?p=30954"},"modified":"2021-04-04T13:17:47","modified_gmt":"2021-04-04T17:17:47","slug":"plan-your-day","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/plan-your-day\/","title":{"rendered":"Deep Work Checklists: Plan Your Day Effectively"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>Looking for advice on <a href=\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/how-to-schedule-your-day\/\">how to plan your day<\/a> effectively? How can planning your day in 30-minute chunks help you <a href=\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/be-more-productive\/\">be more productive<\/a>?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>In Cal Newport&#8217;s <em>Deep Work, <\/em>he suggests that you make a checklist for the work day and for your end-of-day shutdown. Following these checklists will help keep your <a href=\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/deep-work-schedule\/\">deep work schedule<\/a> on track.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Keep reading for Cal Newport&#8217;s deep work checklists.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<!--more-->\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Checklist: Planning Your Day in 30-Minute Chunks<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p>The book <em>Deep Work <\/em>suggests that you <a href=\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/how-to-schedule-your-day-2\/\">plan your day<\/a> in half-hour blocks. This will 1) help you focus on a <a href=\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/focus-on-one-thing-at-a-time\/\">single task<\/a> without switching, 2) carve out time for deep work, 3) confine distraction time to specific periods. You can complete this checklist with your favorite calendar app.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\"><li>Make a list of tasks you need to finish in the day.<\/li><li>Schedule time for each task to the nearest half-hour. Be realistic, but also set a challenging deadline to force focus.<\/li><li>Schedule time in advance for when you&#8217;ll use the Internet. Avoid it completely outside these times.<\/li><li>Schedule overrun blocks for tasks you suspect might run overtime.<\/li><li>Look over your schedule. If you have lots of shallow tasks (more than 30-50% time), consider how you can replace these with deeper work.<\/li><li>During the day, if you have momentum on a task or feel particularly inspired, keep going. After you&#8217;re done, reorganize your schedule.<\/li><li>At the end of the day, review the accuracy of your time blocks.&nbsp;<\/li><li>Reflect: how well did you focus during the day? How could you focus better tomorrow?<\/li><\/ul>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Checklist: End-of-Day Shutdown<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p>Try to end each workday with a shutdown procedure like this one. By clearly stopping work, you\u2019ll free your mind to relax.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\"><li>Check your emails for any last urgent items.<\/li><li>Update your todo list of unfinished items.<\/li><li>Make sure every item in your todo list is scheduled to be done at some point.<\/li><li>Look through your calendar to make sure there aren\u2019t important deadlines you forgot.<\/li><li>Make a todo list of tasks tomorrow.<\/li><li>Say \u201cshutdown complete\u201d to explicitly mark the end of work.<\/li><\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Looking for advice on how to plan your day effectively? How can planning your day in 30-minute chunks help you be more productive? In Cal Newport&#8217;s Deep Work, he suggests that you make a checklist for the work day and for your end-of-day shutdown. Following these checklists will help keep your deep work schedule on track. Keep reading for Cal Newport&#8217;s deep work checklists.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":31011,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[7,30],"tags":[250],"class_list":["post-30954","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-lifestyle","category-work","tag-deep-work","","tg-column-two"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v24.3 (Yoast SEO v24.3) - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Deep Work Checklists: Plan Your Day Effectively - Shortform Books<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Looking for advice on how to plan your day effectively? Following these checklists will help keep your deep work schedule on track.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/plan-your-day\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Deep Work Checklists: Plan Your Day Effectively\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Looking for advice on how to plan your day effectively? Following these checklists will help keep your deep work schedule on track.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/plan-your-day\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Shortform Books\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2021-03-31T14:49:05+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2021-04-04T17:17:47+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/s3.amazonaws.com\/wordpress.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/04\/checklist.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"862\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"509\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Hannah Aster\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Hannah Aster\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"2 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/plan-your-day\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/plan-your-day\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"Hannah Aster\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/f39f52830e4f7039a16e45d12354542f\"},\"headline\":\"Deep Work Checklists: Plan Your Day Effectively\",\"datePublished\":\"2021-03-31T14:49:05+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2021-04-04T17:17:47+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/plan-your-day\/\"},\"wordCount\":349,\"commentCount\":0,\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#organization\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/plan-your-day\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/04\/checklist.jpg\",\"keywords\":[\"Deep Work\"],\"articleSection\":[\"Lifestyle\",\"Work\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"CommentAction\",\"name\":\"Comment\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/plan-your-day\/#respond\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/plan-your-day\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/plan-your-day\/\",\"name\":\"Deep Work Checklists: Plan Your Day Effectively - Shortform Books\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#website\"},\"primaryImageOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/plan-your-day\/#primaryimage\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/plan-your-day\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/04\/checklist.jpg\",\"datePublished\":\"2021-03-31T14:49:05+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2021-04-04T17:17:47+00:00\",\"description\":\"Looking for advice on how to plan your day effectively? Following these checklists will help keep your deep work schedule on track.\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/plan-your-day\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/plan-your-day\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/plan-your-day\/#primaryimage\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/04\/checklist.jpg\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/04\/checklist.jpg\",\"width\":862,\"height\":509},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/plan-your-day\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"Deep Work Checklists: Plan Your Day Effectively\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/\",\"name\":\"Shortform Books\",\"description\":\"The World&#039;s Best Book Summaries\",\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#organization\"},\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":{\"@type\":\"PropertyValueSpecification\",\"valueRequired\":true,\"valueName\":\"search_term_string\"}}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Organization\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#organization\",\"name\":\"Shortform Books\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/\",\"logo\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/06\/logo-equilateral-with-text-no-bg.png\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/06\/logo-equilateral-with-text-no-bg.png\",\"width\":500,\"height\":74,\"caption\":\"Shortform Books\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/\"}},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/f39f52830e4f7039a16e45d12354542f\",\"name\":\"Hannah Aster\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/0302cb2690b70a21639bc6873e587f42d39d02385b7e59d8efd0d3e000ae7681?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/0302cb2690b70a21639bc6873e587f42d39d02385b7e59d8efd0d3e000ae7681?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"caption\":\"Hannah Aster\"},\"description\":\"Hannah is a seasoned writer and editor who started her journey with Shortform nearly five years ago. She grew up reading mostly fiction books but transitioned to non-fiction writing when she started her travel website in 2018. When she's not writing or traveling, you can find Hannah working on home reno projects, crafting, or taking care of plants.\",\"knowsAbout\":[\"Graduated summa cum laude with a bachelor's degree in English and minors in professional and creative writing\"],\"jobTitle\":\"SEO Team Lead\",\"worksFor\":\"Shortform\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/author\/hannah\/\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO Premium plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Deep Work Checklists: Plan Your Day Effectively - Shortform Books","description":"Looking for advice on how to plan your day effectively? Following these checklists will help keep your deep work schedule on track.","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/plan-your-day\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Deep Work Checklists: Plan Your Day Effectively","og_description":"Looking for advice on how to plan your day effectively? Following these checklists will help keep your deep work schedule on track.","og_url":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/plan-your-day\/","og_site_name":"Shortform Books","article_published_time":"2021-03-31T14:49:05+00:00","article_modified_time":"2021-04-04T17:17:47+00:00","og_image":[{"width":862,"height":509,"url":"https:\/\/s3.amazonaws.com\/wordpress.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/04\/checklist.jpg","type":"image\/jpeg"}],"author":"Hannah Aster","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"Hannah Aster","Est. reading time":"2 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"Article","@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/plan-your-day\/#article","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/plan-your-day\/"},"author":{"name":"Hannah Aster","@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/f39f52830e4f7039a16e45d12354542f"},"headline":"Deep Work Checklists: Plan Your Day Effectively","datePublished":"2021-03-31T14:49:05+00:00","dateModified":"2021-04-04T17:17:47+00:00","mainEntityOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/plan-your-day\/"},"wordCount":349,"commentCount":0,"publisher":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#organization"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/plan-your-day\/#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/04\/checklist.jpg","keywords":["Deep Work"],"articleSection":["Lifestyle","Work"],"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"CommentAction","name":"Comment","target":["https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/plan-your-day\/#respond"]}]},{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/plan-your-day\/","url":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/plan-your-day\/","name":"Deep Work Checklists: Plan Your Day Effectively - Shortform Books","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#website"},"primaryImageOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/plan-your-day\/#primaryimage"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/plan-your-day\/#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/04\/checklist.jpg","datePublished":"2021-03-31T14:49:05+00:00","dateModified":"2021-04-04T17:17:47+00:00","description":"Looking for advice on how to plan your day effectively? Following these checklists will help keep your deep work schedule on track.","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/plan-your-day\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/plan-your-day\/"]}]},{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/plan-your-day\/#primaryimage","url":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/04\/checklist.jpg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/04\/checklist.jpg","width":862,"height":509},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/plan-your-day\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Deep Work Checklists: Plan Your Day Effectively"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/","name":"Shortform Books","description":"The World&#039;s Best Book Summaries","publisher":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#organization"},"potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Organization","@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#organization","name":"Shortform Books","url":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/06\/logo-equilateral-with-text-no-bg.png","contentUrl":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/06\/logo-equilateral-with-text-no-bg.png","width":500,"height":74,"caption":"Shortform Books"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/"}},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/f39f52830e4f7039a16e45d12354542f","name":"Hannah Aster","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/0302cb2690b70a21639bc6873e587f42d39d02385b7e59d8efd0d3e000ae7681?s=96&d=mm&r=g","contentUrl":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/0302cb2690b70a21639bc6873e587f42d39d02385b7e59d8efd0d3e000ae7681?s=96&d=mm&r=g","caption":"Hannah Aster"},"description":"Hannah is a seasoned writer and editor who started her journey with Shortform nearly five years ago. She grew up reading mostly fiction books but transitioned to non-fiction writing when she started her travel website in 2018. When she's not writing or traveling, you can find Hannah working on home reno projects, crafting, or taking care of plants.","knowsAbout":["Graduated summa cum laude with a bachelor's degree in English and minors in professional and creative writing"],"jobTitle":"SEO Team Lead","worksFor":"Shortform","url":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/author\/hannah\/"}]}},"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/04\/checklist.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30954","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/8"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=30954"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30954\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":31293,"href":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30954\/revisions\/31293"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/31011"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=30954"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=30954"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=30954"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}