Multitasking Is Productive… Or Is It Just a Lie?
My takeaways after reading the book Lifescale
You’ve probably heard countless times that multitasking is terrible or counterproductive, but if I had to guess, you are probably multitasking all the time, without realizing any problem with it. If you think multitasking is an efficient way of working, then we are like-minded. Today I’ll use my own experience to prove that multitasking is productive and time-saving.
After dinner, while my two younger brothers were still goofing around at the dinner table, arguing about who should wash the dishes, I had already started working on my thousand-
word essay for school. My fingers were dancing on the keyboard, but the argument of my younger brothers covered the clattering sound from the keys. Bzzt, my phone vibrated as I received a notification from my friend, the phone’s screen lit up, and the notification bar appeared in the center of the lock screen.
“Harry, can you help me with this math question?”
“Sure, I’d love to!” I texted back without hesitation.
Knowing that it would take him a couple of seconds to reply, I returned to my essay and tried to remember where I had left off — I was mastering the key of multitasking — not wasting a single second. Just as I had gotten ready to start typing again, he sent me a picture of his math question. Going back to the chat, I took a few minutes to help him solve the problem and having a few more small conversations. Every time waiting for his reply, I would go back and work on the essay. Thirty minutes later when we’d finished with our conversations and I looked at my essay, I realized I’d only written two sentences.
Sorry, I wasn’t able to prove multitasking was efficient. As you probably realized, this article isn’t trying to convince you to multitask. Candidly, I was filled with rage when I saw the two deplorable sentences I wrote. What’s abominable is that I wasn’t aware of the adverse effects of multitasking, it was only after reading the book Lifescale by Brian Solis that I realized multitasking is just a lie, and I was appalled by its harmful effects.
In chapter 2 of Life Scale, the author disclosed the downsides of multitasking, using multiple scientific studies and professional quotes to back his claim.
While reading the book, I was stunned by many things. I never knew we are depleting nutrients in our brain when we switch between tasks and that it will make us prone to short-term memory loss, (which I can strongly resonate with) as I often find myself suddenly forgetting what I was about to do. Another thing that I was surprised meabout wasis that we waste around 40% of the time required for a task if we multitask than if we work on each project individually, because everytime when we are distracted, it takes us around 23 minutes to refocus and return to the task at hand. When I first read this part in the book, I froze and began reevaluating how I worked. The fundamental problem with multitasking is that, while we think we are working on multiple things simultaneously to save time, we’re actually distracted by things unrelated to our original task. The habit of mind I chose to work on is “persisting,” but if I’m constantly getting distracted while trying to multitask, I’m not working towards my goal! All of a sudden it all made sense to me why I usually take double the time than others to finish the same amount of work. As if I was staying in a dark room for my whole life and the door finally had an opening revealing a glimpse of light to productivity.
Though technology has brought great convenience to our life, it has also created innumerable distractions. Most of our distractions come from social media. We watch TikTok when we eat, we scroll through Instagram when we walk, we reply to text messages when we work. Therefore, to eliminate distractions, what could be a better way than reducing our social media usage? Luckily, the iPhone has this handy feature called Screen Time, where I can limit my daily social media usage. After reading this book, I immediately set a limit of one hour of social media per day. And the result was… not great.
Although my screen time dropped significantly by using less social media, I was still getting distracted by multitasking with other things. I would listen to music when I work, which later I started vibing to the song; I would listen to podcasts when I’m doing chores, which later I realized that I took 50 minutes just to fold some clothes and did not remember anything from the podcast. I started to question my method of combating multitasking. But as I kept reading the book, I got my answer: the lack of passion and creativity when I’m working.
In chapter 4, Solis introduces the idea of “flow,” a state we enter when we are fully immersed in our task. We lose track of time and forget the world around us. The key to entering this “flow” lies in our creativity and passion. Thinking back, I don’t ever remember myself being passionate or creative while studying. Bored to death, I would constantly look for distractions to escape reality. So I now seek ways to be creative while studying, thinking of ways to apply what I’ve learned to real life. I’m slowly seeing some progress.
In a nutshell, multitasking is bad. Rather than being more productive, multitasking distracts us from our tasks. But one of the more significant lessons I’ve learned through reading Lifescale is that having the courage to accept that I’ve been practicing wrong methods when working, such as multitasking, is important. And having a flexible mindset to change my habit is more important.
