Daniel Goleman Quotes

A wealth of information creates a poverty of attention.

Even though we don't always realize it, as the day goes on, we have increased difficulty exerting self-control and focusing on our work. As self-control wears out, we feel tired and find tasks to be more difficult, and our mood sours.

Like most early enthusiasts, I always thought the way the Internet encouraged multitasking made users less vulnerable to manipulation, while simultaneously exploiting even more of our brain's capacity than before. Apparently not.

What information consumes is rather obvious: it consumes the attention of its recipients. Hence a wealth of information creates a poverty of attention, and a need to allocate that attention efficiently among the overabundance of information sources that might consume it.

When a man's mind rides faster than his horse can gallop they quickly both tire.

The only factor becoming scarce in a world of abundance is human attention.

[…] a wealth of information creates a poverty of attention and a need to allocate that attention efficiently among the overabundance of information sources that might consume it.

I am aware, as everybody has to be, that there's more competition for one's attention nowadays.

Attention spans get very weak at the speed of light, and that goes along with a very weak identity.

Sometimes I feel like there are just too many things weighing on my mind at once, and I can't control my thoughts or even my body at times.

What information consumes is rather obvious: it consumes the attention of its recipients.

My mind is never stopping. I think, if you stop, you die. Maybe it is a problem for me - I have to talk to myself and say, 'Please stop. Switch off.'

The only problem with seeing too much is that it makes you insane.

Sadly, I haven't had a brain cell since I had children.

People's minds are overloaded with information.

Multi-tasking arises out of distraction itself.

I have the attention span of a mosquito from multitasking and all the things that have affected my poor little brain.

In an information-rich world, the wealth of information means a dearth of something else: a scarcity of whatever it is that information consumes. What information consumes is rather obvious: the attention of its recipients.

I think, at the end of the day, when you hear the same voice all the time, it goes in one ear and out the other when you're a player.

With all the abundance we have of computers and computing, what is scarce is human attention and time.

Your brain is cooked when you write hard for three or four hours.

When you have a limited theory of willpower, you're constantly on alert, constantly monitoring yourself. 'Am I tired? Am I hungry? Do I need a break? How am I feeling?' And at the first sign that something is flagging, you think, 'I need a rest or a boost.'

What it turns out is that we think we're multitasking, but we're not. The brain is sequential tasking: we flit from one thought to the next very, very rapidly, giving us the illusion that what we're doing is doing all these things at once.

If you're making a bunch of little decisions - like, do I read this email now or later? Do I file it? Do I forward it? Do I have to get more information? Do I put it in the spam folder? - that's a handful of decisions right there, and you haven't done anything meaningful. It puts us into a brain state of decision fatigue.

I think getting people's focus, getting people's attention on anything has never been harder, because the media has done everything in its power to try and dissolve people's attention, shift it round absolutely all the time.