I was at the gym tonight, huffing and puffing at the elliptical machine when a woman walked in and asked if I minded if she changed the TV channel to the news. I told her “no problem.” So she changed the channel to CNN, opened the New York Post, took a bite of a Snickers bar, hooked up the ear piece to her cell phone and started walking on the treadmill. I couldn’t help but watch in amusement as I saw this woman try to exercise, eat junk food, catch up with a friend and be abreast of the latest news through two mediums all at the same time. Needless to say, she did not do any of these things very well. She had to keep stepping off the treadmill to hear her friend, the newspaper fell off and the TV was ignored for the most part.
This woman is in the advanced stages of multi-taskitis.
This is the disease of our age that locks us into mediocrity. We have put priority on the number of things one can accomplish over the quality of one’s work. Just look at our cell phones: they are now phones, cameras, MP3 players, and PDAs, but when bundled this way it’s hard to find one that does all of these things well. It’s a simple case of quantity over quality.
I admit, I have a case of multi-taskitis as well. Just today I thought I could read for a class while waiting for something to download and eat lunch all at the same time. Now, I can’t remember what I read, I got distracted before I installed the program, and dropped part of my lunch in my lap. This is what happens when I try to do too many things at once. Reading on the train is one thing, even washing dishes between commercials during my favorite TV show is reasonable, but somewhere me and many, many others have crossed the line between reasonable expectations for what we can do at once and what we cannot.
The frenzied woman in the gym reminded me of this. At first I laughed at her, but then I realized I’m not that different, and neither are many people I know.
So, tonight, I am trying to concentrate on one thing at a time. It’s harder than it sounds.
© Michelle Scott 2006
