[2022-04-12] The endless chatter of our minds
My husband and I made a quick trip to our son's apartment today to drop off a few things, complete a couple of tasks and have lunch with him.
To avoid forgetting things I intended to take to Shane's, I had put them in a box as I thought of them. I had also put a sticky note on the box with a list of perishable items to add at the last minute.
So when my husband texted me to say he was on his way home from the appointment that immediately preceded our departure for Shane's, I grabbed everything out of the fridge and freezer, added them to my box (or so I thought), checked my sticky note and headed out the door.
On the way to my son's, my daughter texted me to say, "I think you left the sushi at home. Should I put it in the fridge?"
So much for my great system! I had left the sushi that was to be our lunch on my kitchen table. Even though I had reviewed my sticky note before leaving, I was obviously too distracted to distinguish between the items I had pulled out of the fridge to take and the items that had actually made it into the box.
I can't even blame my distraction on some external force. The preoccupation that led to my forgetting our lunch was not due to some external force, such as a call in the middle of my packing. No, it was entirely a function of my overly engaged mind.
In his book The Way We're Working Isn't Working, Tony Schwartz differentiates between internal and external factors that interrupt our concentration:
There are two kinds of distractions that fracture our attention. One is internal—the endless chatter of our minds—and the other is external—what's going on around us. We struggle with both, but we arguably have less ability to influence the latter.
I agree with Schwartz that we have less control over external distractions, such as a phone call, text message or breaking news on TV. But the internal distractions can have just as much impact on our attention. Schwartz's expression "the endless chatter of our minds" captures well what goes on in my head. It's like my brain is multitasking, even if my body is ostensibly focused on one thing.
Schwartz notes that there is growing evidence that multitasking isn't efficient despite our thinking that we're getting more done in less time. He says that in a 2001 study, David Meyer and his colleagues found that when participants switched back and forth between two sets of problems, it took them 25% more time to complete the two tasks than had they done them one at a time.
I have a tendency to multitask, even if I know it's ultimately less efficient. I did it in my professional life and still do it in my personal life. To counter this habit, I often tell myself, "finish this task before you start another."
And I'm not alone. Schwartz points out:
We create plenty of distractions for ourselves by juggling tasks, making ourselves perpetually available to others, opening several windows on our computers, and focusing on whatever feels most urgent at the moment, without regard to whether what we're doing is really important. In our reactive rush to stay ahead of a wave we fear will drown us, we're forever racing to keep up with external demands. We're far less effective at setting our own agenda and sticking by it.
Today was a humbling reminder that, even though I'm retired and can set my agenda, I can still overbook myself and overtax my brain.
My system of setting things aside to take to Shane's as I go and keeping a list of the last-minute items to add before I leave generally works. What failed today was the review of my sticky note. For my next trip to Shane's, I'll have to take a page from Santa, making a list and checking it twice.
