One Thing at a Time

What is the fastest, most efficient way you can handle all the things competing for your attention? Prioritize them, and then handle them one at a time. It sounds simple enough, but this goes against the grain of society, which "says" do many things at once to be more efficient.

You see this every day: someone jogging down the road listening to an Ipod or somebody doing work or reading while eating lunch. People double up activities, as if somehow that is going to make things easier, better, more rewarding, or longer lasting.

Consider some of the greatest people in history: George Washington, Gandhi, and Martin Luther King. Were they in a hurry? Sure, they acted urgently because the things they did were important, but did they walk faster, talk faster, try to do any of the things we do today to be
"efficient?" No -- they had mastered the art of doing one thing at a time.

The daily information and media shower leaves each of us incapable of ingesting, synthesizing, or applying the data before tomorrow's shower. You've got to break out of the mindset that society has imposed upon you. Sometimes the best way to be productive is to sit at your desk doing
nothing; at least nothing that looks like anything to people walking by.