It seems like old way of thinking held that multitasking was a normal way to get a lot of things done. Then it was decided that no, actually, you get more done when you do just one thing at a time. But for some people—myself included—multitasking really is the best way to accomplish a lot.
I came to this realization slowly over the past week. My last blog post here on The Backlight was about writing a million words in a year. When I wrote that post, I didn’t really have any desire to actually try writing that much; the goal was just to write more than what I was already doing.
Well, it turns out that I’ve written 3000+ words every day since then. It feels so good to get so much done. But the biggest reason I’ve been able to be more productive and write more is that I’ve been working on multiple projects at the same time.
Before this, I’d try working on one ebook or course or whatever at a time and it always took for_ev_er. The problem was twofold:
- There are so many things that I want to work on that it’s hard for me to stay motivated long enough to finish one thing before going on to something else, and
- When I get to a boring/difficult part, I end up taking the path of least resistance straight to Facebook or Reddit.
But when I decided to try writing 3000 words a day, I realized that in order to meet that goal, I’d need to be working on more than one project at a time. Writing 3000 words on a single subject in a day is not fun. So I started just working on whatever I wanted until I got tired of it, then moved on to something else.
And then yesterday I was reading a bunch of articles on how to read a book a day (I was curious about the people that had done it or were doing it). And one thing that several of the articles mentioned is the importance of having a variety of books around you. One blogger said this:
[T]o read a book a day you need to have lots of books around. Big piles, of all different kinds of books, so there’s always something you want to read.
And that’s really when I realized what I was doing. By having lots of different projects around, I’m always able to find something I wanted to work on.
The result of all of this is that I’m currently working on 2 big products, 3 ebooks that will be ~10,000 words each, and a couple new blogs. I’m writing a lot and getting a lot done, and it’s all thanks to multitasking. Sure, it might take me longer to finish any given project, but I know that the project will get done. That just wasn’t the case when I was unitasking.
Oh, and you better believe this blog post’s 507 words count toward today’s 3000 words.
[Photo: MotiFake]
{ 6 comments… read them below or add one }
Sounds sensible. I’m a web developer – I wonder how you would track a similar target for coding?
Sometimes I write function names or variable names, symbols, and the like… it would be tricky to come up with a word count. Maybe a line count, or a keystroke count.
Setting myself a coding goal would probably not work in practice, but I’m curious as to how it could be tracked.
I don’t code, but it seems that a character count might be the best way to track that. I write everything in Evernote and then paste it into WordCount.is (an “instant” word count tool that does character counts, too) to see my count.
Thanks for the comment, Ben.
Hey Tristan,
I absolutely agree with you. I have tested so many different things, and what I’ve discovered is that I need to work on many things at a time, but I focus on one thing for a specific period. I always write on 3 or 4 projects every single day, but I set aside the time for each project using an app called 30/30. This helps me focus.
But, like you said, if I just did one project in a day I would get bored. The same with books. I always read more than one book at a time.
While I agree with you that there’s tremendous benefit to having multiple projects underway, what you describe above isn’t, strictly speaking, what’s meant by “multitasking.” The multitasking that studies refer to as counterproductive is actually doing more than one thing at the same time — e.g., driving while texting, or studying while watching TV, or similar types of simultaneous activity. What you describe is serial activities rather than simultaneous activities. The first is/can be very productive — for instance, as you and Jens P. Berget both noted above, it can be refreshing and energizing to have a project to switch to if you’re stuck on (or bored with) the project you’re working on. But that’s not multitasking. It would be multitasking if you literally were working on two different projects simultaneously.
Thanks for your post; I enjoyed it!
Laura
While I agree with you that there’s tremendous benefit to having multiple projects underway, what you describe above isn’t, strictly speaking, what’s meant by “multitasking.” The multitasking that studies refer to as counterproductive is actually doing more than one thing at the same time — e.g., driving while texting, or studying while watching TV, or similar types of simultaneous activity. What you describe is serial activities rather than simultaneous activities. The first is/can be very productive — for instance, as you and Jens P. Berget both noted above, it can be refreshing and energizing to have a project to switch to if you’re stuck on (or bored with) the project you’re working on. But that’s not multitasking. It would be multitasking if you literally were working on two different projects simultaneously.
Thanks for your post; I enjoyed it!
Laura
I enjoyed reading this post. It gave me an assurance that I am really getting things accomplished with so many going on all at once. I guess it’s that rush you feel when you’re multitasking that makes you more productive, don’t you think so?