You Can’t Multitask Because It’s Impossible
image by tweetyspics on pixabay
I can only focus on one thing at a time. That’s the mantra I kept repeating to myself as I sat in the middle of an anxiety attack. I can only focus on one thing at a time.
At the time, I became fixated on it because I was so full of anxiety that was the only way for me to keep my head on straight. I could save myself from the overwhelm if I just focused on one thing at a time.
Multitasking can be harmful. That’s the real reason it’s so dangerous to talk on the phone while driving. It’s not about motor skill coordination, even using handsets is dangerous.
It doesn’t matter if you’re hands free because that’s not the problem. It’s because every time your brain has to transfer between the phone call and driving, it’s taking milliseconds to adjust. And when you’re driving that could be the difference between getting into an accident or not.
So, what can you do? Focus on just one thing at a time.
It’s just like a computer with too many tabs open. You keep going back and forth between tabs, trying to find what you’re searching for, but there’s just too much going on.
Too many tabs are open and it’s slowing you down, and if you keep trying to switch between them, you never really synthesize what is going on in each particular tab. As a result, your work is less efficient.
The same thing is happening in your brain. Every time you switch from one task to another, your brain has to recalibrate. Literally, your brain takes a few milliseconds to adjust to the new task. Every time you switch tasks, you actually slow down because your brain has to recalibrate.
You don’t spend long enough on each particular task and it ends up showing in your work.
Even things as simple as listening to music while you work. You don’t think it affects you or slows you down, but it does. Your brain can’t process doing two things at once. It keeps switching back and forth between the two, or however many things you are doing.
As a result, you don’t get as much done.
The solution? Remove all other tasks until you have just one sitting in front of you. Remove all distractions and get started. No phone, no music, no nothing, just whatever is in front of you.
Focus on that one thing until you finish it. If it helps, set a timer on your phone and work until it goes off. Then take a break before you get back into it. This is a simple method used by many.
Of course, multitasking can be fine if you don’t care about results. If you’re taking a leisurely afternoon off, you may find yourself relaxing while drawing and playing music or watching tv and knitting. These actions won’t suffer in the same way by multitasking.
In summary, if you want to be more productive and do a better job at work (or life in general) stop trying to multitask. It is slowing you down. Just start with one and go from there.
