Am glad HN allows re-posting. I'd have definitely missed this wonderful article. I've read so many articles on leadership and this is one and probably one of the few that I've found meaningful along with Ed Catmull's story at Pixar and Jack Welsh's autobiography.
While it's true that Tweets and facebook messages are distracting, it's also true that these are the sources of some of the best available information today. If we learn to tune ourselves not to be distracted,and rather focus on a couple of tweets or facebook messages that we want to or find interesting, that might probably be the best way to stay focused and imbibe all the other qualities that this article has put forth.
I loved the author's discussion of "the deep friendship of intimate conversation" as a form of solitude and introspection. I've experienced increased self-acquaintance through such conversation a few times in life, and can't imagine ever forgetting a single one.
I think a good leader should be adept socially as they are alone. They must synthesize group consciousness into something that works within their own independent thought processes. It depends on the situation. The group can only want something that it doesn't already have. But everyone is their own leader, and a good leader should inspire this intra-leadership in others. Give freedom, not take it away.
The thesis of this lecture makes sense to me. I, however, think it's still possible to do a fair bit of great reading via blogs, Twitter (well, links shared via Twitter)and via Hacker News (take this very link, for example) and not just via great books, but it's certainly easier to get distracted by these.
Yes, you need time to concentrate on doing great things and introspecting, but it's important to open oneself up to different experiences, especially the ones that make you feel uncomfortable (but that won't hurt anyone, I would hope). That means breaking concentration and quite possibly even breaking your own moral values--or those set by your predecessors/institutions and peers, really. If not, how else will you know what's right from wrong or whether you truly dislike something or someone?
I'm not sure Deresiewicz would disagree with that, since he argues that original ideas come about when one can "make associations, draw connections, take [one] by surprise". But I thought it was worth expanding on this idea because in order to make new associations, you have to go out and experience something different that will add new neural connections.
Let's take our so called "war on terrorism". The key question I'd ask myself is, why are there such terrorists? Is it really that they hate our freedoms, our religion, etc? Every time I read some Opinion piece by an author who thinks (s)he knows why terrorists hate America, I am turned away. How the hell can they know if they haven't even been there and lived amongst them? So it saddens me that some of the so-called experts of our time are those who only read a lot and thus can articulate "their" ideas well. I don't care if you read the greatest novels and history books, if you don't get out in the field/real world also, then you won't truly understand an issue and thus, you're not an expert/(thought) leader.
