Sometimes I wish the phrase “multi-tasking” had never been invented. It’s not actually the phrase that bothers me, but rather the level to which we have embraced the concept. Me included.
I am not sure which came first, the idea of multi-tasking, or the increase in expectations that leads the skill to be necessary. At this point, I think we are caught in a vicious cycle.
I talk about this concept a lot when I teach mindfulness in my DBT skills groups. It was a recent topic of conversation with a client. I have also talked about it with many friends who have an interest in yoga and meditation. I will be talking about it with my daughter again as I watch her try to do homework while listening to a TV show!
Mindfulness is considered the core skill of DBT. It refers to focusing our attention on the present moment. One of the key elements of mindfulness is the idea of doing things “one-mindfully,” which means doing one thing at a time with awareness. Contrary to the value we place on multi-tasking, DBT suggests that one-thing at a time is often the way to go!
Every time I teach this, I am reminded of my more extreme attempts at multitasking. One evening, while I was in graduate school, I decided to test the extent of my multi-tasking capabilities. Graduate students certainly prided themselves on mastering this practice.
On this particular evening, I returned home with a list of needs. I was hungry, I wanted to get in a workout, I had reading assignments and, in an age before DVRs, I had a show I wanted to watch. I decided it would be most efficient to do all of those activities simultaneously. You can imagine how crazy I must have looked walking on the treadmill, book opened on the display screen, television on and bowl of cereal in hand.
I did manage to get all of my tasks done, including achieving indigestion. However, the experience highlighted two of the reasons that DBT recommends doing one thing at a time. First, I did not get any of my tasks completed efficiently. Second, I did not get the most out of any of the experiences. I certainly couldn’t recount the details of either my television episode, or my reading assignment. I also didn’t experience the pleasure of getting lost in my show, or the stress relief of my workout.
Beyond these issues with multi-tasking, I find an additional drawback. The behavior communicates a sense of urgency that often doesn’t exist, thereby creating an unnecessary level of stress. I can find myself stressed by small tasks like making lunch if I am also trying to respond to a text. Neither task alone is stressful but trying to them at the same time makes me think nothing can wait and everything is urgent.
Hopefully, no one else has tried my grad school combination of activities. However, I think most of us are guilty of too much multi-tasking. I would love to see a night where my entire family is attending to one task at a time.
This includes multi-tasking in our heads. I know I spend a lot of time processing in my head and thinking about what needs to get done. There needs to be time for all of that. However, it needs to be a time when my thoughts aren’t keeping me away from experiencing what is happening in the moment.
When my kids were little, they would come in my bed in the morning for snuggle time. I loved this time. I loved it a lot more when I realized I had been taking away from its pleasure with my mental to-do list. Instead of just fully taking in the experience of hugs, I was thinking about all the things I needed to do next. Future planning deprived me of current pleasure.
I am not suggesting the extreme that multi-tasking is all bad. It is sometimes necessary. It can even benefit us when the current task is one we don’t want to fully attend to.
I simply know, multi-tasking is a useful skill that I have over-used beyond its benefits. I am trying to find the balance.
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