Why we can't focus
Jared Henderson’s video Why We Can’t Focus is worth your time.
Two ideas that stuck:
- Reading books forges a typographic mind—the ability to follow long, complex arguments.
- Your phone is designed to scatter your attention. It’s not a bug, it’s the business model.
Here’s what I keep thinking about: the digital-first generation didn’t grow up with books as the default. If reading is what builds the capacity for deep focus, what happens to kids who never developed it?
My bet: the gap between readers and non-readers will become a class divide. The ability to focus for hours, to sit with difficulty, to follow a 300-page argument—these will be rare skills. Rare skills become advantages.
The people building the attention economy read books. They send their kids to low-tech schools. That tells you everything.
For my own kids, I’m trying something different. Their curriculum is heavy on art, music, hands-on projects. Attention can be trained outside of text. A kid who can practice an instrument for an hour, or stay absorbed in a drawing, is building the same muscle. Books aren’t the only path. But passive scrolling is no path at all.