After a week of struggling to find and keep my rhythm (focus, creativity, efficiency) between various phone calls and real and pseudo emergencies, it was illuminating to find a Forbes article explaining why it’s so hard to pay attention.
In brief, the reasons are:
- medical: ADHD
- sleep deprivation
- TV and other outside distractions, while we are working
- sedentarism (lack of physical activity/exercise)
- clutter in the workspace
- interruptions
- inborn: the survival instinct is making us react to new information automatically, as a means to avoid danger
- formative: as children, we can develop the ability to engage deeply, but if we are not given the chance (e.g. interruptions etc.) our capacity to focus is diminished
I’d add another: our mistaken perception that multitasking is possible, although scientists have proved that the human brain needs many seconds to reset when moving from one task to another, making multitasking merely a socially approved form of interruption.
Posted under Reading Pack
This post was written by Corina on October 19, 2008
