The Multitasking Myth

Multitasking is a curse on today's society. This is the conclusion of extensive double-blinded, randomized, placebo controlled, muti-arm study. 

Well, in reality, this is my anecdotal study, but hear me out.

Do you want to know why customer service has become so ""canned", so impersonal? Do you ever gaze upon a coworker's illogical email with bewilderment? Do you know why when you go to the doctor you have to fill out a questionarire, tell the receptionist your issue, wait, repeat it to the nurse, wait and then wait a long time to only repeat it to the doctor, who seems to have to go to the bathroom, urgently? Do you stay up late at night worring about the 7 things that you need to do the next day?

Welcome to the horrible philosophy of multitasking.

The idea that you can get many things done at the same time goes against human nature. If I want to type this blog entry and watch the news, and watch the LA traffic out the window...I will only do a little of each, for a little bit, constantly loosing my concentration and then having to remember where I left off. I will be constantly discovering unexplored problems that will make my mind wonder and worry. I will then have to pause, remember what I was doing and try to get back in the same mind frame.

I have an insidious tool on my computer.

 It is a program that is on all the time and tracks when I am "on -line" and it is tied to my calendar, so it show everyone that I am "available". Or worse, it tell others that I am busy, this is the time where I will be interrupted the most. Usually these interruption come with a big lead in apology and explanation as to the urgency of the matter that is intruding into my day.

I have a team member that is terribly bothered when someone is not online. He starts to contact (interrupt) everyone else on the team to find out of we have heard from this person, where they might be, what might they be doing, what in my opinion is urgent in their day.

I work on the plane. I work late at night in bed, when I am on the road, I work sunday evenings. Why? Becuase it is my only refuge, my fortress of solitude from the endless emails that say "yep", "agreed", "good job", "but what if". 

I travel and do reports about my trips. These reports are highly techincal and specific. They must weave a number of different issues, follow up items, statuses, exact counts on medications, expiration dates, serial numbers, documents with exact dates and versions, federal law needs to be endlessly referenced. 

In short it requires absolute concentration. 

If I sit down in my home office to write a report in the middle of a day, it may take me 5 hours. If I do that same report offline later that night, it takes me 2. 

You see, I believe that when we concentrate, we are indeed multitasking: remembering, sorting, expaining, thinking ahead, linking at one moment is time all of our abilities, talents, memory, opinion and experience into one task.  If we interrupt that flow, we only do surface work: "enough to get by"  and it takes us a lot longer. 

Have you ever been asked what you did yesterday and you begin with uh, hmmm, well, let me see...You were multitasking yesterday. That is why you can't remember right away. 

Have you ever asked someone about an email they sent an hour ago and they say "wait, let me find it  and read it to see what I said". Dirty multitasker. 

I had some work done on my car recently. 

I must preface this anecdote with the following disclaimer: The car shop is designed and staffed to be as modern and efficient as possible. A free standing customer service person in the middle of the floor. Computer stations and phones within arm's reach.

As I walked up to the service counter, the customer service person who was on the phone AND typing, looks up to me and only manages an eyebrow acklowledgment that I exist.  He could not find my order, my keys, he could not give me a total, he had the person on the phone on hold... after he "helped me" I sat down to wait some more, amazed to hear him treat every coustomer that way. 

Within 30 minutes there were 6 of us, all waiting for him to finish one task.

The other day I told my online-anxiety coworker that I was geting "off line" to write. He was shocked. What if I missed an email? What if someone wanted to get a hold of me?! 

It can wait or they can call me or if it is REALLY urgent, they can dial 911. But in reality the work is always there. being focused at one task makes me more efficient. It makes my work better.

I completely agree with the scripture that says that there is a time for everything under the heaven. Everything has a time and requires time. Pretending that I can do everything all at once, means I will only become reactionary to what is urgent and not focused on what is impotant.

I also believe that this extends to our personal relationships. Sometimes I find myself mutitasking my kids. Talking to them about the show we just saw but trying to make a point about something that they did, while worrying about something in their future while trying to teach them a lesson. This does not work very well. I have to remind myself to just be with them and deal with issues as they come up.

Yes, a lot of multitasking comes naturally. Life gives us enough to juggle. It comes with enough interruptions in the day, for us to make a work-life philosophy out of it. 

P.S: Funny things that have happened to me as I "multi-task": I tried for about 3 minutes to get into the wrong car this has happened a few times. Walked out of an elevator and into a wedding reception. Scared a family to death by trying to force myself into their hotel room. Gone to the wrong airport. Gotten on the wrong plane. Got a ticket, which started by calling a coworker to tell them I was running a few minutes late, while I was driving, I ended up an hour late and $800 poorer. I saw my supervisor in the pajama top while she inadventantly pushed the camera link on a conference call with 30 other people, becuase she was making coffee at the same time. I have had people walk into me at the airport, pretty much every week, not bump into, but like walk into like a ghost does when possesing someone. I've seen countless men walk into the women's bathroom accidentally, I have seen women do this too. I have heard a former client loose a $350 million dollar contract over an international bidding call in which someone on the team forgot to mute their phone while they went to the bathroom. I have dropped my phone in the shower as I take a conference call, while I showered.  Landed, gotten immediatrly on the phone, then check into the hotel, still no the phone, unpack while on the phone and working on my computer...only to wake up the next day get ready, get to my car and have NO idea in what city or state I am in, this happens about once a month. 

Lucky!!

I rode this train in Chicago 6 days before it drailed on March 24, 2014. The next week I was in Los Angeles, two days later, a major earthquake hit the area.

Someone mentioned to me how blessed I am.

I am not.

Accepting that thought implies that other people, all of the people that were hurt in this train, were not deeemed worthy of divine protection. This implies that I am special or better than them. I refuse to think that.

Taking random data and connecting random dots to create a pattern is foolish. It leads us to believe that if we line up special dots; like religion, touching wood or wearing lucky socks, the wholw univere will line up in our favor.

14 April 2014: Update.

Of all the gin joints in all the towns in al the world...

I am assigned to 2 different, unrelated studies. Two drug makers, two disease groups. one cancer and staph infection. Two sets of sites, one in the west coast (6 sites) the other one takes me from California to Iowa and Nebraska (32 sites). Today the manager for one study told me that one of our coworkers forgot to get a vital document from the site at the previous visit. I mean a terribly urgent legal document of which we needed the original signature. I happen to notice that out of all the hospitals, clinics, labs, in the entire country I am on the campus of the same university...and, out of the hundreds of buildings that make up the campus of UCLA, I happen to be across the street from the place. I walk over and who answers the door? the person I needed to sign the document. Disaster avoided. One manager could not understand how I got the document in 10 minutes, I had to explain it 4 times. She was shocked.

I can think that God build one building in 1976 and the other one in 2011 to make my job serendipitously easy today in 2014, and that all off time I happen to be here today

or

I can accept that despite the almost impossible odds of this happening, it did. It just did. To believe this happened by concidence is crazy, but that is what it is.

This is why I dont belive in luck, as I say:

Luck is the religion of the lazy and the faith of the unenlightened.

A bit of everything

I live by these words.

17 MAR 2014 PM

Ok. Back at O'Hare. My visit went just perfect. The right amount of preparation, luck and timing. Oh, and yeah the site was a block from the subway so I got to take the train into O'Hare, which is $3 instead of a $50 cab ride. Sure, traveling in a suite with a nice leather duffel bag, in the ghetto could be labeled as unwise. Or as my dad would call it "giving papaya", whatever that means.

This may sound like the beggining of a lame joke, but the coordinator, is Syrian, his back up is Iraqi and the  Principal Investigator is a straight up Jew, with the accent and everything. The Coordinator, Dr. Matar Matar was incredibly nice. We had to work in unconfortably close quarters, the thermostat broken with a pouring a river of heat right above my head. I was pouring sweating within 60 seconds. 

Oh, the AC was also on, on full blast, and the windows were open. Yeah, its a county hospital, from 1678 or whenever they thought that the heat and A/C should work at the same time was a good idea.  Super run down, I heard a dope and hooker deal go down with the window open.

I had a the funniest run in with a homesless person. I was hit up 6 or 7 times by hobos in the last 24 hours. My clever response is, "sorry, man, I only have a debit card". Well today one of these guys responds, "no problem man, there is an ATM in the next block, I can wait for you here or come with you, if that's easier" I started laughing and walking away. He continued. He was dead serious.

 "Helping the homeless is worth walking a block man, it's a serious issue, don't you want to help the homeless?!". At this point I was far enough that he was shouting. Apparently he was not just a hobbo, he was also a the greater Chicago area hobo union rep. 

I am going back to the New York approach of pretending they are invisible that seems to work with all charities...I keeeed, kinda.

So back to my Jew-Muslim-Arab story. I waited about 12 minutes before I opened the polical can. Suprisingly all of them were not just types or labels, they were concerned for their families and their people. They get along fantastically. I suddenly remebered that I get my news from the worse place, news sources. 

I told the sirian that his name Matar Matar, may need to be revised if he is going to work in the Hispanic population  in Spanish Brooklyn (he is moving to NYC next month). I almost cracked a joke when the Jew asked if there was any money left in the budget.

This conversation, reassured me once more why people should not be divided by religion or nationality.  Becuase we loose who they really are and becuase it makes working with them in a 70 square foot office, or the world, really uncomfortable.

17 MAR 2014

Off to Chicago this morning. The flight is delayed taking off in SLC, in fact the plane is not even here.

It can be very frustating, delays. It can if you let it.

Life in many ways can be interpreted as a gap between what you expect and what actually happens. In that gap, we can experience happiness or utter bitterness.

The difference in your experience is one realization: You are not in control.

As a society we create the illusion of continuity, certainty and control. These are just illusions. As a society, we have been developed the ability to create artificial environments to make us comfortable, we have grown soft.

I find it amusing to hear people as I travel. 95% of them will start a conversation by complaining. Can you believe this weather?!  Of course they are running late! This airport is so far away from the rental car facility, its ridiculous! These planes are always too hot or too cold, why can't they get it right, ugh!

We open conversations with strangers with complaints. People walk up to the gate counter at the airport: My seat number is not on my ticket! Not: hello, can you help me? or how are you, I was wondering, my....

No. Complaining has become the universal language. It's worse in the US, we invented the term "1st world problems" because we realized how ridiculous we sound. We take time to tell the world that Starbucks did not put enough cream in our coffee. 

This is why I refuse to join twiter. 

What can I do if my flght is delayed? really. What can I do if it snows in Chicago? Or if a flight attendant does not show up to work and I am late for a meeting? 

Nothing.

I am suddenly reverted to my ancestors trying to figure out why their crops did not come in or why someone got sick and died. I can dance around the fire and pound dirt, but I can only make a difference by being patient or trying something different.

This is my travel motto: if you are prepared, ye shall not complain. And even then, no one wants to hear it. 

We have a limited amount of influence around us, let's not waste time complaining. There is no problem in life that won't be made worse by complaining.  

25 Feb 2014

On my way to the OC. At one point in my life I hated traveling to California. Hated it...and I usually dont hate anything or anyone. That has completely changed now. It was all a matter of perspective. I was flying into LAX, driving to Van Nuys to doa job I did not care for and going back to the airport, all in rush hour traffic.

Fast forward 10 years later and I love going to Cali. The difference? Perspective.

I see the last 10 years of my life in the same light. I have matured, thought, learned how to plan effectively and to pickthe route, clients and experiences that I want to have.

Christinanity teaches that we should not judge. That extends to all situations in which we are not experts, including our very own life.

 

California is overcrowded...because so many people want to live there. California has ugly parts, becuase it iso ne of the largest economies in the world. California has too many laws...well because California politicians tend to be clowns.

In my 30's I have learned that I do not know much. I thought I knew a lot, but it turns out I knew a lot about the little I knew.  A decade  ago, I beleived black people were cursed by god. A decade ago I firmly believed that gays were just sick people, or just perverts or defective. 10 years ago, I believed that blind obedience would bring glory. I had come to separate the God of freedom, intellect, wisdom, the one who wanted me to learn all things from the one my church taught me about. They had at one point become different guys. The church God did not like questions, history, truth, facts, non-members of my church...and he kept making a lot of statements that contradicted not only the basic teachings of christianity, but the core gospel of what Christ taught, the principles I used everyday to guide myself.

Once I had that epiphany, I was able to carry it out to its logical conclusion: the church and the gospel were different, and often at opposite ends. 

I changed my perspective. Suddenly my life was completely clear of illogical, fallical, mental hoops. Suddenly I did not have to accept racism, that my skin was a curse on my "lazy" ancestors, that god contradicted himself, thet pretended he did not teach the thing I had spend years trying to accept.

It all made sense, my life was filled with joy, familiy, time and means to enjoy it. It all was clear once I came to the excruciating realization that MY church was not what it claimed to be.