Toggling

When Jesse was five he learned to hop on one foot. He also learned to snap his fingers. And wink. He then figured out that he could do them all at the same time AND turn in a circle as he did so. And sing!!! This hopping, winking, snapping, singing, circling child is how I came to understand the word “multi-tasking.” I have yet to know anyone else who could do anything like it.

I have tried, of course. As a single-mother who worked a stressful full-time job and had lots of things that I liked to do including spending time with my child, I came to think that washing dishes or cooking while speaking with Jesse and jotting occasional notes about this project or that or making mental lists of things to do, that this behavior made me a full-fledged member of a club whose existence people seemed to value: multi-tasking.

Books were written, talk-shows had a field day, trainers emerged and made money, people prided themselves on their ability to accomplish SO MUCH every minute of every day.

I now know better: multi-tasking does not exist. People who drive and do anything else – talk, listen, eat, write, day-dream, scratch themselves, use electronic devices (hands-free or otherwise) prove that statement. Statistically. Sadly. People cannot be fully engaged in one activity and be fully engaged simultaneously, in a second. The best that any of us can do is toggle, to switch quickly from one to the other.

Designers and behavioral scientists who study these things have long known that text in Power Point presentations does not work as a visual aid to a lecture, sales pitch or anything else. The reason is that if people are reading words on a screen, they are not listening to the speaker. Simple. True. They may read quickly, then turn their attention to the speaker. Or they may be rapt in the speaker and force themselves to glance at the screen – after all, it’s THERE - to see what’s so important that they need to read it. They may take notes, jotting down key words that they see on the screen. But if they do that, they have not heard and absorbed the words spoken during that jotting down time. Professors who are wise professors pause pregnantly to allow their students to jot. They want to be SURE they are listened to and heard.

Recently a new woman joined our bridge group. It was my deal. While I dealt I was telling a story. OK – those two things, talking and dealing, are pretty much toggle-able. Except when one loses place with where the last card was dealt. Then everyone has to count their cards. And perhaps re-deal.

Anyway, after dealing, I started the bidding. Once the bid was established – my partner and I had bid a mini-slam, which I had to play – I started the play while continuing to tell my story. I made the bid!!! Incredible. Even though I have made six before, I rarely had BID six and then made it. I was thrilled.

This lovely recent addition to our group, who had been my partner, looked at me and said “I have never in my life met anyone who could make a small slam all the while telling an involved and funny story!” Well, I hadn’t even thought about it. I was just doing what I was doing. Maybe that explains how I could do it: maybe I wasn’t THINKING about either or only one of those tasks. Maybe the slam was so obvious that I could just play out the hand and let the points and distribution take me to a small slam. Or, maybe I had told the story often and was just reciting it “from heart” without engaging my brain, which was focusing on playing out the hand.

In any event, I am CERTAIN that I was toggling back and forth – perhaps very quickly – and NOT multi-tasking. I am positive that it can’t be done.
Yes, people can open a door and sing Offenbach simultaneously, perhaps even roller skate while doing so. But only ONE of those things has their attention. The other tasks are being performed by rote. I am positive.

So how can I explain Jesse’s ability at five to perform that incredible combination of skills seemingly simultaneously? I can’t. Unless the answer is the same as above: he did not have to actually concentrate or pay attention to any one of those things. They all came naturally to him at that point. So the best explanation I can offer is that he was multi-living; doing what came naturally. Otherwise, I can’t explain it. But I did enjoy it enormously. Which is how Jesse came to know the meaning of “Bravo!” and “Encore!” and how much fun it is to have people smile, clap and beam radiantly at you.