This post is also available in: Español (Spanish)
This one is going to be short and straight-to-the-point. Well, you know … my version of “short”! Hahaha!
I’ve been conducting an experiment, and I would love to share it with you. Maybe some of you will find it as beneficial as I did. Please keep in mind that I would never tell you to practice something without first trying it myself. The reason I write this blog is because I feel like I’ve improved my life significantly by adding new practices, and I love sharing them to inspire others to try new, better habits.
When I’m not reading a physical book, I listen to audio books. (No, that is not the experiment, but you should try it.) I completed an audio book few weeks ago (I’ve shared the book title in my “Feed your Mind” section), and I learned many great things. But the advice that impacted me the most was to stop multitasking. I know, I know! Don’t panic yet. Let me explain to you the reasons behind it, and then you can decide if you want to give it a try.
Back in my 20s, I used to tell my friends that I could not walk and chew gum at the same time. Meaning, I needed to focus my attention on only one thing at a time. It was a joke, but I really meant I needed to concentrate if I was getting ready for, say, a big anatomy test. I wasn’t the type of student who could listen to music while studying.
Well, this way of focusing changed a lot through the years. In fact, a couple of years ago, I was a firm believer that I was a multitasking queen. I mean, come on! I was able to perfectly manage two full-time jobs and deal with a divorce at the same time. It was easy to think I was great at multitasking, right? It turns out I was wrong. I am not good at multitasking, and I actually now think nobody is. I learned from that book that we can’t keep our complete focus on two different things at the same time. We can switch between them, but if two activities require our full focus, our brain does not have the capacity to give 100% attention to both of them simultaneously—it’s one or the other. If you’re thinking, “Excuse me, Irene, but I can walk and breathe at the same time,” you should know that those activities are regulated by different parts of the brain, so they don’t interfere with each other.
The book does an incredible job explaining all the facts that prove why multitasking is an erroneous concept. If you like to learn new ways of improving, I highly recommend you read it. After I finished reading it, I forced myself to stop what I thought was my ability to multitask. How did I do this? Well, I have performed a few experiments over the past few weeks, most of them involving my cell phone. I went all the way from leaving my phone in a separate room while I was replying to customers’ emails, to turning it off while working on payroll. I turned off notifications on my watch while working out. I walked away from the computer while I was talking business on the phone.
Here are just a few of my results:
- I completed my payroll tasks in half the time by turning my cell phone and all notifications off.
- My calorie-burning-to-time ratio was more effective just by not getting notifications on my watch during my workout.
- I did not have to call my business partner back to ask him what time he told me to schedule a meeting (yes, this happens often when I talk and “work” on the computer at the same time).
Even though it may not sound right, I can assure you that giving my focus to one thing at a time has saved me a lot of time these past few weeks. Actually, switching between tasks takes a lot of time that we don’t notice. So from now on, I’m going back to the way I lived in my 20s: I won’t walk and chew gum at the same time.
The reason I wanted to share this here on my “Divorce Smart not Hard” blog is because I know we make the false assumption that doing as much as we can at one time will help us feel better and heal faster. This assumption is not truth, though! You will feel better by actually accomplishing goals and getting things done, and the best way to do that is by focusing on one thing at a time. So if you are willing to give this a try, let me know how you feel after few weeks.
Love,
Irene
