Will mono-tasking one day become the new norm

To mono or multi-task? This is the question.

Every day a new buzzword comes along to give wings to our social, business and family lives. They last awhile and eventually end up in the old buzzword’s retirement villa.   

The most overworked catchphrase of modern times is the ghastly, “Think outside the box.”  Among others, we’ve had “No-brainer,” “All hands on deck,” “Game changer,” and “110 percent,” all geared to lift us glorious heights.

When IBM introduced the popular tag “multi-task” in 1965, it was considered the ultimate to moving our directional compass to warp speed. Now we’re finding out this isn’t exactly all it’s cracked up to be.

We are learning that with multi-tasking often comes emotional, stress and health issues. It’s like smoking looked cool in the 1950s movies, but we learned it had consequences.

I came across newspaper ads from the 1940s and ‘50s showing physicians recommending cigarette brands and considered smoking only a mild throat irritant.

One ad shows a kindly old doc flashing a beaming smile. He is holding a pack of Lucky Strike.

Below are the words “20,679 physicians conclude Luckies are toasty, less irritating.” Another says, “More doctors smoke Camels than any other cigarette.”

Multi-tasking became the big “it” as technology grew, resulting in not enough time in the day. It is an addiction among those proudly able to juggle six or seven balls in the air at one time.  

Now we are learning there is a proven case for mono-tasking as a better alternative.

A recent study, Psychology Today found multi-tasking can make us overly optimistic, less careful and more mistake-prone. In some reports multi-tasking resulted in sloppy work and lower GPAs among college students. 

An audio book titled “Speed” by Stephanie Brown, PhD talks about society’s self-destructive addiction to faster living.

It begins with a patient arriving at her office, tossing his cell phone on a sofa and pleading, “Can you help me control my phone? It’s ruining my life.”

She explains, “What is supposed to help us is hurting us. What is supposed to free us ends up enslaving us. The lure seems so good, so positive, so helpful and so harmless. And then we are hooked.”

What to do? This is where mono-tasking comes in.

By definition mono-tasking is focusing on the here and now. It is paying attention to, and completing one task at a time.

“Mono-tasking is a deep mindset and causes you to reexamine your relationship to time—our most precious fundamental asset,” wrote Dr. Bryant Adibe. “At the end of our lives, no one will look back and review how quickly we responded to emails.”

It’s like what Albert Einstein said: “Any man who can drive safely while kissing a pretty girl is simply not giving the kiss the attention it deserves.”

Ted Buss is a former business and sports editor at the TRN and author of three books.