A laptop for single tasking.

Issue #276 of the Better Humans Newsletter. Subscribe here for inspiration and knowledge. [Tony Stubblebine](coachtony?source=email-c7f27b30bfea-1663796330779-newsletter.subscribeToProfile-7038e003d060------------------------41925732_d5d9_45da_bca1_624cee4aabee--------de6e5ad096a9)[Tony Stubblebine](coachtony?source=email-c7f27b30bfea-1663796330779-newsletter.subscribeToProfile-7038e003d060------------------------41925732_d5d9_45da_bca1_624cee4aabee--------de6e5ad096a9) in [Better Humans](   ∙  3 min read   ∙  [View on Medium]( A laptop for single tasking. Issue #276 of the Better Humans Newsletter. [Subscribe here]( for inspiration and knowledge. ··· The best thing I ever did for my phone was to turn off all red badges and turn off most notifications. The theory is that technology should be a tool you control, not your boss. For example, I think notifications are misnamed. They should be called interruptions because they are almost always being delivered to you for someone else’s benefit. Not to get hyperbolic, but a huge amount of design work at technology companies is focused on how to control and manipulate you. If you aren’t careful, your phone will become your boss. My key goal when I configure a computer is to reach a state of single tasking where I am in control. That means I’m working on only one thing at a time and that thing is something I chose. Getting to this state is relatively easy on a phone since the default mode is that you are only using one app at a time. Mainly, you just have to get rid of interruptions. But I’ve always found designing my laptop experience to be much harder. The problem is that my laptop serves so many use cases: work, leisure, managing the details of life. So in a given day I could be doing taxes, researching a vacation, watching a TV show and also, yes, putting in a full work day. Then during that work day I could be writing, slacking, emailing, zooming, etc. It’s just a mess. On the one hand, kudos to computers that they can serve so many needs. But one machine set up to do that many things is a cognitive load that we’ve become blind to. At a concrete level, you can start to count how many visible modes of work you can see on screen at once. As I write this, I see a Chrome screen with four tabs that all refer to different projects. Usually it’s much worse, with windows peaking out from behind my active window. On top of that, there’s also a habitual overhead. When I open my laptop a world of neural pathways warm up wondering which I’m about to activate. That’s a bit of a pop-science explanation but I think is close to the truth. There is cognitive overhead in deciding which of the many use cases you are about to engage in. All of this is to say that I started a new job and got a new laptop and only set that laptop up for one use case: work. I keep my other, previous laptop around. That is set up for doing the bills, managing my savings, software development for my last company and every side project I’ve had in the last ten years, doing taxes, etc. Yes, my backpack is now heavier. When I travel, I travel with both laptops. But when I open my work laptop, my mind is lighter. I feel more focused. I love it. This is much closer to single tasking than I ever got by trying to hack together multiple Chrome personas, workspaces and window sizing keyboard shortcuts. I’d recommend it. You might be able to approach this on one machine by having different accounts with dedicated uses. But I think there is something cognitively different about using physically different machines. So if you haven’t already recycled your last laptop, try setting it up for a single use case. ··· As a tangent, since I don’t really have any place to put this: I think the M1 Macbook (16" MB Pro) feels like the biggest computer upgrade I’ve had in more than 20 years. There are two things that make it a much different experience. The battery lasts much longer and the machine runs much cooler. Combined they make this laptop much more comfortable to use. [Reply to this story](mailto:tony+newsletter@tonystubblebine.com?subject=Re%3A%20A%20laptop%20for%20single%20tasking.)[View story]( Sent to {EMAIL} by Tony Stubblebine on Medium [Unsubscribe]( from this writer’s Medium emails [Unsubscribe from all]( newsletters sent using Medium Medium, 548 Market St, PMB 42061, San Francisco, CA 94104[Careers]( Center]( Policy]( of service](