Cal Newport’s Personal Framework
The idea of writing down your roles, your values, and the routines that sustain you is not a new one . People rediscover this principle of keeping a personal framework, to help them live the kind of life they want to live, all the time.
Cal Newport writes about the intersections of technology, productivity, and culture. His influential books Digital Minimalism and Deep Work in particular address how individuals can cultivate what I call a well-lived life, and what he calls the “deep life.”
In his podcast, Deep Questions, he recently outlined how he uses a list of his values when he makes personal and work-related plans (Newport, 2021).
First Things First: Your Personhood Precedes Your Productivity
I’m a big fan of Newport’s philosophy of productivity. He emphasizes that a good productivity system is a tool to serve the whole person. Your personhood comes first! Your productivity system is there to serve you, not the reverse.
Therefore it did not surprise me to learn that Newport also keeps what I would call a personal framework. He doesn’t call it that, but he bases his productivity system on a written list of his values and habits, which he reviews weekly.
Keeping your values at the foundation is the heart of person-centered productivity. I think his approach is useful, so let’s walk through it:
Identify Your Roles, and the Values You Associate with Them
Newport keeps a document he calls “Roles and Values.”
He identified some of his roles as a parent and a spouse; as a professional; as a member of communities; and as a “spiritual/philosophical being” (Newport, 2021).
Write Down the Values-Related Actions that Your Roles Point You Toward
A list of roles and values is nice, but it can only make a difference in your life (and others’ lives) when you put those values into action.
Newport’s method is interesting because you can suss out your values by identifying actions related to your roles in life. He advised looking at each role and writing out sentences, a narrative, by starting with the words: “I want to be…”
“I want to be someone who X,”
“I want to be the kind of parent who does Y.”
When you write out your values like this, you make them concrete. You identify specific actions, specific habits or behaviors, that go with actually living out your values.
Here’s an example from my own list of roles and values:
Roles: “I want to be the kind of mother, wife and friend who …”
A values-based behavior related to the role: “…who listens when the people I love want to have a conversation with me.”
So I wrote this concrete values-based action, “When people I love want time with me, and I am just fiddling on the computer or my phone, I lock or shut down the tech toys and walk away, so I can be truly present with them.” (If I am working intensely on something, I might ask that we talk a little later.)
The key is that I’ve expressed my value as an action, a measurable behavior: I either turn away from scrolling through my phone and turn toward my family member — I live out that values-based action — or I do not.
Use the Words “Always” and “Never” to Help You Write Down a Personal Code of Conduct
Newport also has a list he calls his “Personal Code of Conduct.” I have a list like that, too, which I call my “Personal Policies” list. In Newport’s code of conduct, he writes down sentences that start with, “I always do this…” “I never do this, I never do that…”
You probably already have some of these.
Recently a friend told me, “I always return the grocery cart to the store.” What do you try to always, or never do? Write those things down — that shows you how you’re already living out some of your values.
Newport did not share specifics from his personal code of conduct list, but one of my personal policies is this one: “I don’t commit verbal violence toward anyone, including myself.”
This is something I have to work on. Snark comes easily to me. Eventually I realized the damage verbal zingers could do in my relationships, and the damage my internal name-calling did to myself. So, I wrote that as a personal policy: “I don’t commit verbal violence toward anyone, including myself.”
I still have to practice this value, but it helps that I wrote my commitment down where I can review it and work on it. Which leads us to…
Make a Weekly “Values Plan” and Choose an Action to Practice
Writing this stuff down is a waste of your time if you don’t act on it. The way to make sure you act on your values, live them out, is to a) write them down, and b) review them regularly. Which is something Newport does.
The last thing Cal Newport talked about in this podcast episode was how he reviews his values-related lists each week, and writes down an action that he can do over the coming week, to shore up values he feels he needs to practice. He calls this a “values plan.”
I review this [roles and values list, and personal code of conduct list] each week, and I hone in on a part of my code of conduct or value that I want to focus on. (Newport, 2021)
This could look like making plans to deepen connections by calling people over the next week, or attending to your inner life by taking the first hour of the day for reading and journaling.
Newport identifies small actions he can do during the next week to live out his values. He’ll write down a sentence about one thing he could practice the next week to shore up a value he wants to address.
The podcast episode ended with Newport recommending the practice of having what he calls a root document where you have identified your values, with some of the core concrete practices you do, to live those values out.
So there we have it: a personal framework in action.
Newport has written down the roles, values, and habits (routines) that are his framework — the root — of the rest of his organizing and productivity systems. He reviews it regularly, and he puts it into practice.
This is exactly how a personal framework helps you shape your life into the kind of life you really want to live.
References
Cal Newport’s description of his value plan and values-related documents: Deep Questions, Episode 103 - What is the Relationship Between Order and Well-Being? [1:00:45 - 1:05:59], https://www.calnewport.com/podcast/, accessed June 7, 2021.
Notes
If you want to hear more, Newport talks about defining your values in general in episode 122, Figuring Out Your Values [36:59].