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Multi-Task Like A Queen

A cute graphic came up on my FB page last week with this message, "My mind is like an Internet browser: 19 tabs open, 3 of them are frozen, & I have no idea where the music is coming from."  I read it out loud to my husband, and he just about spit out his coffee.  This is soooo me.

At any given time, if you opened up my Mac, you would find at least 10 tabs open (as I type this 14 are open).  Since I'm on my "work" Mac (just a year old) nothing is frozen and thankfully I've remembered to turn off the sound.  However, if I were typing this at home on my 7-year-old dinosaur of a Mac, no doubt files would be frozen and Chrome would be churning, but not kicking in.  I am who I am.

I have a love-hate relationship with Mac.  I expect it to work perfectly all the time.  Even when I don't shut down for weeks on end. Or if I don't update programs.  Or if I refuse to delete email, so I have 48,000 unread messages in my inbox.  When it doesn't work, I go bananas.  



We have become accustomed to user-friendly technology that is ready to go right out of the box.  The manufacturers are to blame for making their products too easy.  Whether it's an MacBook, iphone, Galaxy, Alexa, etc. all we do is charge it up and go.  Just. Like. That.

It wasn't that long ago when computer problems were the norm. I remember when I first got a cell phone and when I switched over to the dark side (iPhone).  Boy was I stubborn.  Cellular phones weren't to be trusted. We worried about dropped calls and security breaches.  Those were the days...

With the advent of efficient, reliable smart phones, the need and expectation to multi-task has grown significantly.  As a result, we have 19 tabs open on our laptop.  Here's the deal, most of us can't multi-task.  In fact, according to this article in Psychology Today https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/brain-trust/201202/is-your-brain-multitasking
only 2% of people can actually multi-task well.  These rest of us, well, we're better off doing one thing at a time.

So what do we do? We just can't stop doing more than one thing at once.  In this results-drive, never say "no," win-at-all-cost society that we live in, multi-tasking is (and will continue to be) expected.  (I bet many of you reading this even said "multi-tasking" was one of your skills during your last job interview.)  Luckily, we're not the first to recognize the problem.

 Google "best way to multi-task" and you'll get 6.4 million results.  While you could hone your multi-tasking skills by skimming these articles during a conference call, I'll save you the trouble.  Www.fairygodboss.com provides a great list of tips.  Here they are:

1. Write down goals and make a to-do list, then factor in time to get things done.

2. Combine similar tasks to work on at the same time.

3. Eliminate distractions.  Close your office door and turn off your phone.

4. Check in with your tasks and goals; use tools (like apps and calendars) to help.

5. Review your work to make sure everything was done correctly.

It all comes down to plan, prepare, and review.  Clearly this isn't rocket science, nor is it new information.  You have heard it from every teacher since elementary school.  It's just a practice of doing it.

I'm pleased to inform you that as I finish this article I have only 4 tabs open on my computer (Reinhart Central, gmail, blogger, and Nordstrom), all are running smoothly, and the only music I hear are the birds outside.



Note: This information first appeared on my real estate blog, "Sarah Sell My House."

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