Myth Of Multitasking – I once called up a friend of mine and asked her,” Hey! What’s up?”
She replied, “Nothing much. I am cooking food, checking my facebook and now I am talking to you as well.”
I was like Whoah!! That’s too much for a single moment and then I went on to figure out whether multitasking is a great idea or not.
Well, many of us are usually multitasking and we proudly flash the crown of a multitasker as well. But this is something that we must know. It’s not a good practice at all. Hey! Hey! I am not going to for a lecture session but here are a few Myth Of Multitasking which you must know and then take your call.
Myth Of Multitasking
If you believe you possess this skill of doing several things at a time and you have gained an expertise over this then, you are totally mistaken. Researchers at the Stanford university have found out that that people who are heavy multitaskers are terrible at their jobs than people who prefer to lay their hand on a single task at a given point of time. It is because most of your energy is wasted between switching from one task to another and hence you cannot pay attention to either of the tasks.
Your efficiency and performance levels are terribly reduced because your brain can only focus on a single task at once. When you compel your brain to shift focus from one chore to another, your brain is unable to filter out irrelevant information thus making you a complete failure at multitasking.
Your IQ levels also tend to decline if you have the habit of multitasking. Researchers at London have found that people who multitask during events that demand cognitionexperience low IQ scores which was similar to what they would experience if they enjoyed marijuana or didn’t sleep all night.
Texting while watching television if that is your field of expertise, then you are approaching towards brain damage. Now, that you are a high multitasker, you tend to have less brain density in the anterior cingulate cortex, a region which is responsible for empathy as well as cognitive and emotional control.
When you juggle between different tasks, you naturally slow down and you facilitate the issues like difficulty in concentrating, organizing things and paying attention to details to greater extent. Due to this you tend to make more errors.
You are inviting more stress. Yes! Multitasking lowers your self-esteem and can even push you into depression. For eg. if you prepare for a test while watching a football match, this can trigger a lot of stress.
The most interesting thing is that this act of juggling is also a threat to our relationships. When you shift your attention from the person to your phone (for example), your partner gets mad. Both of you then check your phones and ultimately you both are disconnected. You tend to miss out on life and hence the ultimate sufferer in this is your bond which deteriorates with time.
Now that you know it has its own limitations, another factor which comes to light is that it is dangerous. Yes. It can be as dangerous as drinking and driving because you tend to miss out the details. You are inattentive and this has been termed as inattentional blindness.
So, what’s the solution? I have been multitasking all my life. So, how do I re-wire myself to this? Well, you don’t need to do much. All that you need to do is to focus on one thing at a time. Divide your time according to your work and then allocate your time. Spending 20-40 minutes on a single task will surely achieve you better results and shall make you even more productive.
To gain a better hand at your productive side, you can practice meditation techniques which will help you to remain focused on a single chore.
These are the Myth Of Multitasking – Bonus- You can also use timers while dedicating a chunk of your time to the tasks and eliminate distractions. Most importantly, set a designated time to check your e-mails.