Multitasking isn’t
The Myth of Multitasking is a short book that conveys a single, critical idea: to do two things at once is to do neither.
The Myth of Multitasking: How Doing It All Gets Nothing Done, by J.D.
JD’s blog entry begins with him describing the 227 tasks open on his computer as he writes. “That’s 227 discrete tasks awaiting my attention. That doesn’t count the dozen or so books submitted for review, the eight unread personal finance magazines, and the pile of papers spilling onto the floor.”
He says multitasking is really switchtasking and not productive. While I generally agree, there are times to set a task aside and let it ripen while you work on something else. Switchtasking in larger chunks can lead to more creative completions than sloughing through each task one at a time. Hand some off to your unconscious for ripening. The trick is knowing when to do that - not letting it become an excuse for procrastinating.
Parallel task - internally - tasks waiting quietly on the computer don’t count.
