Professional Jugglers

One of my favorite personal jokes I use to describe myself with is "I don't multitask, I parse." (parse: definition - To analyze or separate (input, for example) into more easily processed components. ) With the exception of involuntary functions, I'm just not capable of doing two things at once. And if by some small chance I am doing two things at the same time one or both are invariable ruined. The girls who work for me always laugh because if I'm typing on my computer and they start talking to me at some point I realize someone is next to me making noise and turn and look at them with a vacant expression. Now they know to wait until I'm done. Sometimes I look up and a little line is formed for people who want to talk.

I give a pretty good impression of multitasking at times especially when I'm working with children, but what I'm actually doing is scrolling through everyone in the room in my mental database and checking to see if someone needs attention if they don't I move on to the next. Or I take note of hands put in order of priority and scroll. I was talking to a friend on Saturday and he at least agrees with me that multitasking seems impossible, but for some reason by today's standards is held up as the ultimate achievement in success. While my mind boggles at how people are successfully capable of doing more than one thing at a time. I can barely walk and talk at the same time. Sometimes I actually have to stop walking in order to finish a complete thought.

Yesterday I amused my students greatly by a comment I made when I was helping a girl with her physics homework. The problem was a particularly tricky one and I needed to focus all my attention to it so I said, "Hold on a minute I need to go to the bathroom so I can focus on this problem completely." Not realizing that this would be very funny, but everyone started laughing. But the truth is I couldn't focus on the problem while thinking about having to go to the bathroom.

Then I read an excerpt from the July 19, 2004 edition of the Los Angeles Times written by Melissa Healy that read:

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Multi-tasking, for most Americans, has become a way of life. Doing many things at once is the way we manage demands bearing down on us at warp speed, tame a plague of helpful technological devices and play enough roles - parent, coach, social secretary, executive - to stage a Broadway show.

But researchers peering into the brains of those engaged in several tasks at once are concluding what some overworked Americans had begun to suspect: that multi-tasking, which many have embraced as the key to success, is instead a formula for shoddy work, mismanaged time, rote solutions, stress and forgetfulness. Not to mention car crashes, kitchen fires, forgotten children, near misses in the skies and other dangers of inattention.

So turn off the music, hang up the phone, pull over to the side of the road and take note: When it comes to using your brain to conduct several tasks at one time, "there is no free lunch," says University of Michigan psychologist David E. Meyer. For all but the most routine tasks - and few mental undertakings are truly routine - it will take more time for the brain to switch among tasks than it would have to complete one and then turn to the other.

When the two get squished together, each will be shortchanged, resulting in errors.

And a prolonged jag of extreme multi-tasking, warns Meyer, may lead to a shorter attention span, poorer judgement and impaired memory...

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The article goes on to talk about studies in people in their 40s and 50s who are struggling with forgetfulness and realize it's a result of depression, stress, and "role overload". I guess my brain has it's own fail safe. It won't let me multi-task full stop unless I feel like tripping over my feet and hitting the ground every 20 - 30 minutes.

Feel free to tell me what you think. As always have a good day and enjoy.