Multitasking is Overrated?

At the beginning of the summer, a fellow mom suggested going for walks together. I was excited. I loved walking and I was happy get to know the mom better. Since we both had dogs, I immediately suggesting walking with dogs. I thought it was clever. I could hit two birds with one stone. I was going to have a chat, and walk my dog at the same time. I thought I would combine my duties with pleasure; dog care and self-care. It didn’t take me long to realize how wrong I was.

It turned out that our dogs had different exercise needs. While Lilly liked leisurely strolls on the leash with her human, my young German shepherd was used to fast pace and trailing and tracking during walks. As a result, instead of focusing on the chat and enjoying the walk, I had to focus on keeping my dog in line and keeping up with the conversation. What was supposed to be a relaxing walk with a friend and our dogs turned into an hour of physical and mental wrestling.

Why did I think it was a good idea?

Well, despite all the new research proving that multitasking is overrated and utterly inefficient, the truth is, old habits die hard. As a society, we were expected to juggle things for decades. The ability to multitask was something a strength worth bragging about during a job interview- it could land us a (very stressful) job. Now that mindfulness is in vogue, perhaps we resist multitasking during a yoga practice, but outside the yoga studio, do we really need to give each task hundred per cent of out attention or will seventy five per cent be just enough? Personally, as much as I value and practice mindfulness, I also often settle for the seventy five per cent.

If I am feeling sharp and the tasks are light, familiar, and I can do them on autopilot, I can handle the multitasking safely. But with tasks that are more complex or creative, or tasks that demand my full presence, like active listening, multitasking does not seem such a clever fix; more of a waste of mine or someone's time.

Coming back to my walks, I realized that if I wanted to continue my meet ups with the other mom, I had to revisit the idea. I had to stop looking at it as a two in one solution: dog’s exercise and socializing, in one hour. I had to choose one main goal of those meet-ups.

I quickly concluded that having a meaningful conversation was for me the most important aspect. Once I established that, I asked to move our walks to a later time, so I could take my dog for a run before that. When she was tired, she was way more content to stroll on the leash and I was less frustrated and happier to chat away.