There is zen...

There is zen, and then there is multi-tasking. Zen-like concentration brings the mind to the moment, with all its energy focused on the task at hand. Motion is spare, attention at its peak, and alertness and beauty are brought to every action.

Multi-tasking conjures up images of frantic scrambling of limbs and objects, and lots of mental flailing. According to a recent news story that cites a study at Stanford, not only is multi-tasking a painful state of being, those who are most into it are actually the worst at it.

In the study, it turns out that the more media multi tasking the 262 student participants did, the worse they performed at cognitive tests, ironically for "switching tasks", "focus" and "filtering out distractions." The research, conducted by Dr. Clifford Nass, was published in an online journal of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. The researchers expected that those who did the most multi-tasking would perhaps have MORE innate ability to handle multiple sources of media input and information flow. Unfortunately, the opposite was true.

Next time you are tempted to try to do several tasks at once because you think you are short on time to accomplish your goals, try setting priorities, and following through in a deliberate way instead. You might be surprised to find that you don't need to be constantly frazzled to really get things done.