Reflections on a Recent Analog Experience

In January, I had a conference to attend in Washington, D.C. Given that it is a relatively short drive (about 4 hours), I reserved one of our departmental vans for the trip. Originally, a few colleagues were going to ride with me, but I found myself at the last minute, traveling alone. I moved my things from my car and jumped into the van. I have recently acquired a new car that has all sorts of bells and whistles. It seamlessly connects with my cell phone; it can read my messages aloud and takes voice commands to open my music apps to play the song of my choice. This allows me to multitask “safely” while I am driving. This is a significant upgrade from the 11-year-old minivan I gave to my son who recently got his driver’s license. When I hopped into this minivan, I realized that there was no interface for my phone. After trying for several minutes to devise a solution, I gave in, put my phone away, turned on the radio, and hit the road.

Now, for the family members reading this, you can remember the days of car trips when you were at the mercy of the radio stations available based on your location. It hurts to admit that most of our students today have no recollection of that time! While I was expecting to dread the trip and lack of on-demand tunes, I was surprised by my joy, caused by the unexpected thrill of finding a radio station that played songs I liked and songs that I was not expecting to hear. I grew up on country music and stumbled into a long set of '90s country hits. I shamelessly belted out a few as I drove down the road. I also was surprised by how quickly an oddly catchy car sale jingle can get stuck in your head, and stay there, particularly when that car dealership is nowhere near your house.

I heard just about every musical genre on this four-hour ride to Washington, D.C. I even spent some time in silence without the radio on. I will admit that in that stretch, all I could find was talk radio. In those quiet moments, I thought about several particularly complex situations at work that I have been needing to spend time thinking about more deeply. I also took in the surrounding landscape and marveled at the traffic heading into the city. I got to my hotel and felt surprisingly refreshed, clearheaded, and ready for the conference.

Now, you might be thinking that the takeaway lesson is about the distraction of technology. And it is to some extent. But more than anything, it was a lesson that sometimes the most appropriate and joyful thing is effectively accomplishing a singular task. So often, I find myself, and our students, trying to cram too many things into any given moment. This includes trying to send emails while in class, spending time with friends while maintaining a lively online presence/checking social media, or studying while watching TV (I had to include that one!).

There is quite a bit of research documenting the fallacy of multitasking. But I also wonder if there is something unsatisfying about trying to complete multiple things at once. That means you miss the satisfaction of completing one thing well with your full focus. In “How Multitasking Affects Productivity and Brain Health,” a quarterly digital mental health publication, Kendra Cherry points to findings from several research studies that indicate that we are not as good at multitasking as we think. Cherry explains how we are less productive, make more mistakes, and get distracted when trying to multitask. It made me wonder, too, if we rob ourselves of the small moment of joy that comes with productive completion of a task. I invite you to join me in testing a hypothesis. That is, does a “finish one thing and move on” mentality create the possibility for satisfaction in our very full lives? Perhaps as you talk with your student this spring, you can ask questions about how they are, how they’re focusing their energy, and how they’re putting their time and effort into doing things well (and one at a time!). I am going to try it myself and see what happens!

My hope is that this semester your students will find a bit of unexpected joy and satisfaction from a more singular approach. I hope they find the surprise of experiencing quiet, stillness, and the time and space to think deeply about the things that are most important in their lives. Now, FM radio may not be the source of that joy, but I remain grateful to it for helping me step out of my busy, connected, multitasking life for a few hours!