From hypertasking to singletasking: How to do it

Chicago Tribune (MCT) - Multitasking is either the back­bone of civilization as we know it, or the scourge of our very souls.

It is, after all, the reason that laundry gets folded, meals get made, dogs get walked, friends get called, bosses get e-mailed, bodies get exercised and kids get car­pooled, even if those activities _ stacked end to end _ would take far longer than a person's allotted waking hours in a day.

It is also why we can't remember what our spouse told us five minutes ago and why we find relaxation to be such a, well, chore.

So is it really faster? Here's an experiment. We found a multitasker extraordinaire, a woman for whom "multi" isn't really a strong enough descriptor.

(Gazilliontasker? Infinitytasker?) Anyway, she's Jacqueline McBride, and she lives in Western Springs, Ill., with her husband, Jason, and five kids: Vivienne, Aidan and Georgia (7-year-old triplets), Finnian, 5, and Declan, 2. She describes her average week as such: "Normal house work, cleaning, laundry, cooking three meals plus snacks, grocery shopping and the norm. I am the kindergarten room mom for Finn and just hosted the party for them including all the crafts and supplies. I volunteer on Mondays for phonics. I also help coach soccer and get all of the four older kids to and from all social engagements and soccer and basketball, soon to be baseball and soccer."

But there's more. So, so much more.

She designs and sews baby blankets, children's clothing and T-shirts for moms, which she sells at local boutiques.

She has a side business reupholstering furniture and making window treatments. And she dabbles in the odd side job at home.

"My friends think I am crazy because I paint my own house and put up my own crown molding in my kitchen," she says.

She's also a triathlete. "All of my training during the week has to happen before 7 a.m. so I can be home when my husband leaves for work," she explains. "I help train a group of women, about 14 on a good day, on Thursday mornings at 5:20 a.m. at the Lyons Township (Ill.) track. On Saturdays I work at a running store (Run Chicago in Forest Park, Ill.) from 6:45 a.m. until noon."

We challenged McBride to stop multitasking for 48 hours. For two full days, she was to pursue only one activity at a time _ no chatting on the phone while driving to soccer, no checking e-mail while cooking dinner, no folding laundry while checking the kids' homework.

McBride took our challenge.

This mom of five, artisan, volunteer, triathlete and running coach, tried _ she really, really tried _ to give up multitasking.

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But it was rough.

"I'd keep catching myself, especially in the morning," she says. "Like while the pancakes are cooking I usually fold laundry."

We wanted to find out if she'd feel more focused and less harried by concentrating on one task at a time. Or, conversely, whether multitasking is as necessary to modern life as electricity and take-out.

For McBride, the truth lies somewhere in the middle. "For some things, focusing on one task just wasn't as efficient," she says.

And some things just didn't get done.

"I usually TiVo shows and fold laundry and go on the Internet at the same time," she says. "But I couldn't do three things at once, so I didn't watch any shows. I also didn't finish the laundry because I think I got bored doing it."

But she did employ a few tactics that she's hoping to stick with.

1. Hang up the phone. "I didn't talk on the phone while I was driving, and I did spend more time talking to the boys," she says.

She also learned to be more selective about which calls to answer at their Western Springs home. "Our phone rings all day," she says. "The phone is a huge underminer of singletasking."

2. Make a to-do list. By making lists of everything she needed to complete each day, McBride found she was able to start and finish a task and then cross it off her list, rather than starting it, starting something else, starting yet another thing, and then going back to that original task.

3. Delegate. "You have to off-load your stuff if it's going to get done and everyone's going to get out the door on time," she says.

So while she normally makes breakfast and lunch for the kids simultaneously, McBride asked her husband, Jason, to make breakfast while she assembled lunches.

McBride says she's not likely to give up multitasking altogether. But she'd like to carve out portions of each day when she focuses on only one thing at a time (not in the morning, though). And she's serious about giving up phone calls in the car.

"I probably will fall back to my crazy ways, but the list thing is huge and putting the phone down is huge," she says. "And being better about giving whatever you're doing your full attention."

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