There are two types of attention we give- Divided Attention and Selective Attention.

Divided attention is where our minds are giving our attention to multiple sources at the same time.  Selective attention is when our attention is focused on one thing.  Generally speaking, having the ability for divided attention is good, but often the way we choose to use that ability is not good.

Sometimes life requires we give divided attention.  Too much divided attention leads us to feel spread out and overwhelmed.

When we give something our selective attention we’re able to go deeper and get into a flow state more easily.

Many things require our selective attention, but we often try to get away with just giving our divided attention.  How many times have you been watching a movie and instead of giving your selective attention you decide to look at your phone?  At no point do you feel like you aren’t paying attention to the dialogue, but before long, you look up and realize you have no idea where the characters are, or what they’re doing.

Selective Attention

When we use our selective attention we’re able to get into a flow state and even menial tasks such as vacuuming or unloading the dishwasher can leave us feeling rested, almost like we just finished meditating.

Selective attention tends to make life slow down.  We live in a culture where we’re always trying to accomplish five things at once and we end up feeling like we didn’t accomplish anything.  I’m guilty of this in many ways, which is why I’m writing this article about the issue.  It’s hard for me to slow down and just do one thing at a time.

When I’m only doing a single thing, even if it’s watching a movie, I feel like I’m wasting time.  When I try to remedy this by doing multiple things at once, I end up getting nothing done.

Consciously Practicing Selective Attention

I’m a few days into my no social media experiment.  Not being able to mindlessly grab my phone and scroll Facebook or Instagram during down times has forced me to be more present.  It’s early on, but so far so good.

When I’m holding my daughter I try to think about just holding her and being in the moment.  It’s tempting to want to reach for my phone, because it feels more productive to multi-task.  A lot of times I do reach for my phone.  But, I’m trying to be more conscious of it.  The last few days, again because of the social media ban, I’m doing much better at not reaching for my phone.

What reaching for my phone actually does is rob me of the moment I’m spending with her.  I know it’s a moment I’ll never get back.  She won’t be a newborn much longer and whatever’s happening on my phone will always be there, just the same as it ever was.  So why is it so tempting for us to reach for our phones and divide our attention?

Our lives are made up of individual moments.  Very few of them seem noteworthy at the time but add enough of them on top of each other and you build a lifetime.  I want to look back on a lifetime of memories where my intention was focused on the present moment.  I don’t want modern life to rob me of that.  The idea of unwittingly spending my life with my attention spread out- barely noticing that I’m holding my future 38-year-old daughter in this brief moment in time where she’s a newborn- is terrifying.

When we’re always trying to get the most done in each moment we don’t have time to breathe in the moment and let it happen to us.  I’m just rocking my daughter, I should check Facebook too.

Physical vs Mental Selective Attention

When doing physical projects we are forced to have selective attention with our bodies.  It makes no sense for me to be vacuuming while simultaneously writing an article.  The transition between the two projects would waste so much time that neither one would get done.

When the project is in the mental realm we feel like we can accomplish multiple things at once.  When we try to do this we end up doing a poor job at both, and often taking longer to do it.  Because the transition period is physically instantaneous when we’re doing mental tasks- such as scrolling Facebook while watching a TV show- we feel like we’re successfully multi-tasking.

The problem is any time while we were reading the article our brains were blocking out whatever was being said on the TV and vice versa.

Just How Good Are We at Giving Divided Attention?

There’s a famous experiment where a man asks strangers for directions.  Halfway through someone walks between them with a bookcase.  When the bookcase is completely blocking the view of the stranger they swap out the man asking for directions.  The people giving the directions almost never notice.

They even tried swapping the man asking for directions for someone of a different race and even gender.  Almost always the people giving out the directions didn’t pick up on the swap.  Here’s a quick video from the Khan academy explaining this experiment.  They also do a couple quick tests that helps to illustrate just how hard it is to focus on multiple things at once.

The Sea of Concert Cell Phones 

Mr. Burrito Bowl Rant coming in 3….2….1

People filming concerts on their smart phones is one of my biggest pet peeves.  Instead of actually watching with their eyeballs, and being in the moment, almost every person there spends the entire performance playing amateur filmmaker.

What are we thinking?  If you asked anyone there if they had the patience to sit down and watch someone else’s video of the very same concert the answer would be a resounding NO.  Sitting down and actually watching our own video in its entirety would be so boring we’d have to tweet about it.  We just felt compelled to film it so we could put it on Facebook and get a bunch of likes.

We are a sick people.

How Selective Attention Relates to Life Satisfaction

Put your phone down and watch the concert.

View it from the lens of your eyes without wondering how many likes a potential post would get.  Your shaky cell phone video won’t capture the moment, and those of us who weren’t there really don’t give a shit.  You know this because you don’t give a shit when you see random clips from concerts that you weren’t at.  If you want to relieve the concert it will be available on the internet from a professional videographer.

When you watch a movie, just watch it.  Resist the urge to pick up your phone and scroll through social media.  Every scene in the movie took multiple takes to get everything just right.  The lighting, the camera work, the way the actors say each line all took precise planning and exhaustive repetition.  Enjoy the movie.

When you’re eating dinner with a group of people resist the urge to see what is going on ‘out there.’  Focus on your group of friends.

Life doesn’t pause just because we stop paying attention.  Life is a continually moving reel and every time you take your attention off the present you’re missing a scene.

If you enjoyed this article please share it with your friends and enemies.  Seriously, though, do it.  I feel like sometimes you think I don’t really want you to share it, but I do.  

Here’s a few more articles you might like to read with your undivided attention.

No Social Media For A Month!! AAAHHHHHHH

How Investment Fees Are Decimating Your Portfolio

How to Quickly Tell if You Can Trust Someone