Single Tasking vs Multi Tasking

In this fast paced world, often we want to do a lot of things in very few time. Lots of travel and places to visit. Lots of things to finish in a day. Lots of achievements to have. Lots of music to compose and sing. Lots of money to be earned. Ask anyone, the quantity is often big. Very few people will say small. Now pay attention to these people. They are often the happiest in the lot. Some of them are scientists and many are working on real "world changing" inventions and discoveries and solutions. Not the ones that the so called Silicon Valley churns out where every one has a big data, cloud solution that is supposedly going to change life. All these silly motos aside, you focus on the productivity of some of these people. And there are many more in the same league and yet you find there are few who transcend the heights rather well. In your day to day job, you might see that one or two colleague who are ever smiling in the face of pressure. It is not that they are immune to it or somehow they have landed themselves in a spot where they will be not accountable if things go wrong. Rather, it is just that they know they have to plough thru it. They are more confident and cool about it. More than any other virtue or trait, I think the main thing is that they are sure that they will follow a process. A routine. This process or way of doing things is something from which stems confidence and coolness and calm composure under pressure.

At this height of 40000 ft above the rest of the people they have very few peers with whom they confer and they reference and get / give some ideas. Post that they just soar to newer heights to 50000 ft where there will be even more fewer things. At 60000 ft, it is just them and this task or project. They focus, focus and focus more relentless. They are a saint or a sattvic yogi at this point who is meditating on only one thing. And one thing only. At this point till 80000 ft it is so high and out there that they can see earth and moon and the outer space.

I do not know if in real life what happens in such a height. Most commercials that I fly just go till cruising altitude of 30000 - 40000 ft and then that is it. But there are many which soars very high. Think of yourself as a solo pilot to this. And it is just you and your task. This app is about that. It is not going to physically get you there. Not for the 99 cents that it will be listed on the app store for sure. But it goads you to go get there mentally. At this height and at this state of mind where focus and power of concentration is so priceless, would you rather want to fritter it away by doing more than a thing? Do you want to do something that could be simply handled by someone else ?

How many people on a day to day basis think of the following:

1. I am going to write a very good book

2. Am going to write a very good article

3. Am going to code a great reusuable library.

And so on.

In any field, there are going to be very hard things to do. Not necessarily complex. There is a difference between complex and hard. Sequencing a genome is complex. The computer which does it and the program to be written for that is complex. Doing that at a level where accuracy and speed is not compromised yet the quality is absolutely phenomenal - now that is hard! Anyone can do randomized algorithm, ML or AI or train your model to do something by looking at a dataset or video or feeding some data to model. Now get that algorithm to do something meaningful in an efficient manner takes some real hard thought process.

There was an article the other day in Medium asking to do more single tasking compared to multi tasking. Multi is more mindless and if its something that requires maybe 5% or less of your brain then go ahead and do it. Its monotonous by nature. Then there are others who are forced to multi task for various reasons. And there are others who focus on doing only one thing and one thing only and they do it well. And then they leave it at that. At that time, they will not be taking any other tasks. And focus on only at the one in hand. Compare this to multi where your head and the priceless commodity of attention and concentration is dissipated in different directions leading to lack of sustainable output in any one task.

Many tasks are single tasking or single threaded by nature. For instance, if you are learning something or giving exam you do that on one topic at a time. If you are playing a game, you do that only. Same with coding or researching, not sure about what doctors do, but carpenting or any other skills and talent based projects will be similar, I suppose. Hard to see any technical field out there where focus is not prized. Or driving for that matter. Though that can be categorized as a bit mundane and hence is prone to automation. But designing a car or inventing a solar powered source or making more electricity efficient vehicles. Anytime I read a quality white paper, the thing that stands out is the intensity and power of the work, of the human mind behind it. Not just abstractions and simplicities but the chunkiness of the underlying thought processes and its various manifestations.

This tool, in that way, makes you look and question this process, review and revise it and improve it constantly. Then focus and practice relentlessly. Is not that the point of focusing on a given task? Or the how to better focus? The more you focus on a particular task, the less noise from others tasks in the headspace. This is easier said than done and hence there is such a growing industry in the US about mindapps and brain-training apps and similar apps that deal with brain, mind and so on.