Our team at work has slowly been heading back into the office over the past few weeks. It has been great breaking – bread with teammates over lunch and sharing jokes. I will say though that nothing beats the comfort of working in sweatpants in the comfort of my living room. Today at the end of the day a colleague asked me a question and I just stared at her and later let out an uuummh. She creased her brow in confusion and asked the question again at which point I immediately “snapped out of it.” You see the whole day has involved hopping from one Zoom room to the next, responding to email and other “online activities” that have called for my attention here and there. Basically by the end of the day my brain was fried.
You see the moment we access the streets of the world wide web we are being called upon to make a decision whether we choose to want it or not. There is always someone throwing something at you. Even when we watch a hilarious reel on Tiktok; we are making a choice to RESPOND to the content. The moment we check our phone in the morning – whether we respond to a negative or positive text, read news e.t.c – it already begins to take up space in our “mental faculty.” Whether we want to address it in the moment or not , we are being made to THINK about it. The moment an email comes in and we jump to respond to it immediately, we are deciding to forgo doing something else to put out that fire. These are all decisions; we make them unconsciously most of the time while online; but by the end of the day our brain has exhausted all its “good judgment” capacity. This is the reason you hear the term, “sleep on it” – it helps to make decisions after a good nights rest and our brains have had a chance to rejuvenate and see the world through fresh lens.
I say all that to say, our brains have not evolved at the same pace as technology. There are so many decisions that are flagging us down so the more we can organize our interaction with technology the better we will be at organizing our days and our lives. Next time you find yourself scrolling from one video to the next, hopping from one Zoom call to the next; slow down the tempo, catch a breath and remind yourself that not everything is an emergency and not everything needs your immediate response.