Have you ever tried to talk to someone that keeps looking at his/her phone during a conversation? While talking to you, he/she may be replying to a text and driving at the same time. People are crashing more often, getting run over by a car, losing job opportunities and losing the respect of coworkers and supervisors because of multitasking. People may multitask in the name of time management but something is wrong with that. Multitasking has more of a negative impact in a person's life that we can account for. The following are some of the repercussions of multitasking.
Multitasking is associated with harm to our brains. It reduces cognitive control and the regulation of motivation and emotion. Check the 2014 study here.
Multitasking can lead to memory problems. Chronic multitaskers show weakness in both working memory and long-term memory.
Multitasking can lead to increased distractability. Multitaskers gradually lose the ability to distinguish between important and unimportant interruptions.
Multitasking can make us walk into traffic. A study of 1,400 pedestrians in New York City who were hit by a car revealed that 20% were teenagers distracted by a mobile device when they were struck compared to 10% adults. 280 teenagers and 140 adults is enough of a reason to keep phone in pocket while walking.
Multitasking harms relationships. Smartphones are now a threat to relationships at the workplace and especially at a personal level. Multitaskers cause their partners to experience significantly reduced relationship satisfaction
Multitasking will make us less productive, less efficient and less joyful but true time management will help us know that there is a time for everything under the sun. Time management will stop us from texting when having a real person in front of us. True time management will prevent us from checking social media while walking or driving. Ecclesiastes 3:1-4 says: For everything there is a season, and a time for every matter under heaven:
a time to be born, and a time to die;
a time to plant, and a time to pluck up what is planted;
a time to kill, and a time to heal;
a time to break down, and a time to build up;
a time to weep, and a time to laugh;
a time to mourn, and a time to dance;
It's illogical that a person mourns and weeps at the same time. It's irrational to break down at the same time we build up. Multitasking breaks down, but focusing builds up. The true time management taught in the Bible will lead us to do the right thing, at the right time and will bring blessing upon ourselves and upon others.