Hey Whipple, Squeeze This, 6th Edition

15CREATIVE MIND VERSUS MONKEY MIND: OR, MANAGING TIME, ENERGY, PANIC, AND YOUR CREATIVE MIND.

There is no such thing as “multitasking.”

Ever notice what some middle-schoolers do while they try to focus on their homework? They're scrolling through Instagram, they have the TV on “in the background,” there's music playing on their laptop, and all the while their phones are vibrating with hugely important texts from BFFs.

If you challenge them on this less-than-ideal learning environment, they'll likely protest, “But kids are different today because we can multitask!” If multitasking means simultaneously doing several things poorly, then yes, they're different.

To describe this popular and ineffective mindset, author Linda Stone coined the term continuous partial attention, in which we skim the surface of multiple incoming data streams, pick out a few random details that appear to be important, and move on. Although such an approach may give the illusion of productivity, in reality you're slowing down your progress. You're casting a wider net but catching less.

Here's the thing. Attention is binary. It's on or it's off. You're either paying attention to something or you're not. Which is to say, what didn't work back in middle school won't work today.

When you sit down to concept, turn everything off—all the way off. Turn off everything except your brain.

Quit wasting time on email, Instagram, wandering around, and coming in late.

In 2019, Adobe did a survey with 1,000 of their ...